We had to arrange our own flights to Beijing and met in the airport there on 1st September. We flew to Yanji in Jilin Province, where we were taken to a Korean restaurant and were served a typical Korean meal, sitting on the floor round a very low table. From Yanji we visited Tumen on the North Korean border. Not surprisingly, there were restrictions on the photos allowed, and we were able to walk half way across the bridge over the boundary river. The Korean influence was very strong, with all advertisements and signs in both Chinese and Korean.

On day 3, the coach took us to Changbaishan – a national park that is clearly a popular tourist spot. Special buses and then jeeps took us through the clouds to the top of the mountain. From here there was a climb to see the deep blue Heavenly Lake in the extinct volcano. The lake is the source of the rivers Songhua, Tumen and Yalu. Chengcha River flows from the northern point of the lake and turns into churning rapids and falls from a 68 metre cliff. Some of the group took the opportunity to bathe in the hot springs. Further walks through the forest to see stone-age canyons and their flora rounded off a very hectic day.

Next day we stayed in Dunhua in order to visit Jingbo Lake and moved on to Changchun, where we visited the palace of Pu Yi, the last (Qing) emperor. This is a large estate, set out as a museum, with many buildings containing descriptions of Pu Yi’s life and collaboration with the Japanese occupation.

Then came the train journey from Changchun to Baicheng. We had reserved seats, but had to persuade the Chinese occupants to let us use them, causing huge disruptions as we tried to stow all our luggage in racks which were just not big enough. Although the journey took 5 hours, it passed very quickly with some of our group chatting with Chinese passengers in spite of some language difficulties (although many of our group spoke Mandarin).

At Baicheng we were met by a new coach driver and local Chinese guide. After a short trip from Baicheng, we stayed in Ulanhot, a recently modernised city with brightly-coloured Disney-like buildings. That day we had a more adventurous ride along a mainly single-track road to a mountain lake in an area run by a forestry commission.

From Ulanhot we were in Inner Mongolia, where the scenery was very different: hundreds of miles of flat grasslands where there were occasional yurt settlements and flocks of sheep and goats and herds of cattle wandering freely. We stayed in A’ershan and visited the largest deposits of volcanic lava in Asia. There were many signs of massive development with new roads, buildings and even an airport being built near the city.

Next stop was Manzhouli, on the Russian border. On the way we visited a Mongolian complex – admittedly set up for tourists, but it gave a good idea of their life and some of the group enjoyed a short ride on their horses. We all enjoyed the singing and dancing (including by ourselves) in a big yurt, where we had a taste of Mongolian tea and saw exhibits of Mongolian handicrafts.

We had been warned that accommodation in this region may be basic, but were pleasantly surprised. When visiting restaurants we had some excellent meals, with dumplings becoming a favourite and one great experience of a ‘hot pot’, in which we boiled raw meat and vegetables.

The evening meal at Manzhouli was different. We visited a Russian restaurant expecting to get Russian food and see some local dancing. The place turned out to be a local basement ‘nightclub’ with ‘pole dancing’ and sparse food. Before we left Manzhouli the next morning, we were given a talk about the area by the head of the local tourist office which helped to put this unfortunate experience in perspective.

The final day was spent driving to Haila'er, via a Tibetan monastery, which is being built to balance the unhappiness caused in the area during the Japanese occupation and thousands of local men died while digging tunnels for the Japanese preparing to defend the land from Russian invasion. We flew back to Beijing from Haila'er.

For those of us who did not speak Mandarin, there were several of our group willing translate introductions. I must also mention Michael Sheringham and David Su, the tour leaders from the UK, who both gave talks en route and encouraged others among us to speak about their experiences of working in China. They, together with Mr Xu, the Chinese tour organiser who travelled with us, sorted out many problems on our ten day tour.