I’m Chris. A Brit in my 60’s. I’m a computer and weather geek. I like photography, although I’m not artistic enough to take good pictures. I sometimes take a good picture by accident though!

I’ve travelled a little over the years, but never anywhere outside my comfort zone of English speaking countries, or where there’s a tourist population that mean the locals speak English.

In 2015 I got the opportunity to travel to China for the first time. My girlfriend (Yanan) invited me to go home with her to visit her family and friends, and to do some sight-seeing.

This wasn’t to be normal sight-seeing though. We would travel through the country seeing it as the Chinese do. Not on a tour bus, full of Europeans and Americans, zipping from famous landmark to famous museum. Very few western faces to be seen anywhere. Little western food. An unknown language. A little known culture.

This was culture shock China!

I loved it so much that we went back again in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019. We’d have gone again in 2020 but a certain global pandemic made it unwise to travel!

This blog is my attempt to give you a flavour of China that most westerners will probably never see. Follow my journey…I hope you find it interesting.