Bliss! A full English breakfast!

Wednesday 23 May

Our room is on the 3^rd floor in the Hang Tang hostel, in Xi'an. There's no lift, so at least we'll be getting some daily exercise. The laundry room is on the 2^nd floor, and the hostel does it for you, at 10 yuan (£1) a kilo. I'm not surprised to find that our washing weighs 6 kilograms, but I think it's fine to pay £6 for such a big load. I've long ago stopped separating white and dark washing on this trip , as it means 2 washes, and so much hassle. But I know I'll go back to separating the washing when I get home.

We love this hostel – it's superb. It's modern and smells of new wood and new decorating. What's more it serves a full English breakfast – 2 eggs done how you want them, 2 slices of bacon, 2 small sausages, mushrooms and tomatoes, toast and butter, for 45 yuan, or £4.50. That is really expensive by Chinese standards, but Reg and I decide we deserve a treat. Our breakfast arrives beautifully cooked, and tastes delicious, especially accompanied by a pot of English breakfast tea.

While eating breakfast get talking to 3 lovely English girls – Sophie, Chloe and Lauren. Sophie and Chloe have been travelling together since January, and are going back home to England in a weeks time. They've been to Los Angeles, Australia, Figi, Bali and Thailand as well as China. They met Lauren while travelling, and have kept in touch, meeting up again at various points. We exchange

stories of our adventures, plus they give us some hints and tips for travelling in Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. A young German called Dominic joins in the conversation halfway through, and before we know it, we've all been chatting for about 2 hours! I ask the girls who are going back to England next week how they feel about going home – having been away since January. They say they've loved their travels – but are all “psyched up” to go home now. What have they missed, I ask? Sophie says, without hesitation, “Roast dinners!”

I have no energy today and go back to our lovely comfy bed for a rest, while Reg sorts out some more train tickets, for our journey from Beijing to Hangzhou, on Saturday week. He needs to scan in a signed form to send to China Trains, and is relieved to find that he can do this at our hostel. You can only buy Chinese train tickets 10 days ahead, but buying the tickets through China Trains means Reg can order them in advance, and they are then sent by courier to our next hostel. All this costs more but at least you can be sure of getting the tickets you want. We've found it difficult to buy the tickets in person, apart from when our Chinese guide Frances was with us, because of the language barrier.

There's been problems with the wifi in this hostel, but it's back on. I go downstairs to the bar area with Reg and we post yesterdays blog on the internet, and send a couple of emails. It's lovely to receive an email from our son, George, and others too. How lucky we are to have family and friends who care about us back home. We enjoy ordering a pot of tea, and I indulge in a piece of chocolate fudge cake – it's hard to find nice cake in China!

Later we take a stroll and decide that tomorrow we'll try (again) to post my parcel of clothes back to England; then we'll cycle around the walls which surround the town of Xi'an. On Friday we'll visit the famous Terracotta Warriors.

We find a small unpretentious cafe with pictures of the available food dishes on display. I choose egg fried rice, which comes really hot and is very tasty. Reg orders a noodle dish which takes a bit longer to come. We try to order tea, but the waitress brings soup instead – though we find this too is scalding hot and delicious. The waitress brings us slices of pink watermelons and lychees, too. The whole meal for the 2 of us comes to 18 yuan (about £1.80). For a change, I really enjoy what I eat, and so does Reg.

Returning to the hostel, we have another chat to the 3 lovely English girls, and Dominic. Then we decide to leave the young ones to it, and retire to our room. It's only 6.30 pm, but we're still tired after yesterday – perhaps all the travelling is catching up with us. I write this blog in Open Office (wifi isn't available in our 3^rd floor bedroom), and Reg watches a channel called ESPN, which is a sports channel in English; they are talking about, and showing highlights from, the European cup between Bayern Munich and Chelsea, which took place last Saturday.