We had a big day of parks planned but it was raining when we woke up, which we hadn't counted on. And Mikey managed to flood the bedroom when he had a shower (not his fault, the drain was blocked with long black hair) so we spent a while rescuing and drying rucksacks and mopping the floor. After collecting some beautifully laundered clothes that had even been ironed (oh, the luxury!) we tried to explain to the lady who let us into our room that the drain had been blocked and the bedroom was flooded. Even my most animated flooded bedroom mime was unsuccessful and achieved nothing but a scared look and a hasty exit by the girl. We set out with extra layers of clothing on against the rain and found that the temperature had dropped considerably overnight - there were even flecks of sleet in the rain and the air was decidedly icy. We changed our plans and went out to see a temple instead.

It seems that banana buying must be a week day activity, because there were hundreds of wheelbarrows out this morning with men selling the fruit willingly and without the need for a huge amount of begging or miming on our part. And I think puppy-selling is only done on weekends, because there were none on the stairs to the subway. Oh, and another thing - these last few days, as we've walked along the road to the subway, we've passed all the stalls of eggs boiling in brown liquid, the lovely-smelling pancakes and fried breadsticks in vats of fat, and the little wooden house at the end of the street with bits of pig outside it. On the first day we went past there was the whole pig carcass, opened up at the belly but otherwise intact, hanging on a hook. Yesterday it was split into various pieces, the head staring at us as we passed. Today it was just the spine draped over the railings and a few lumps of flesh on the hooks from the roof.

We got to the Lama temple, the largest Tibetan Buddhist temple in the city, and took an audio tour round the site. It was a very large complex, with many traditional Chinese-style buildings that sort of blur into one another after a while. Lots of intricate carvings, plenty of red and gold and nice roofs, big courtyards and incense being burned. Many of the pagodas and pavilions held religious artifacts inscribed in the four languages of the religion: Tibetan; Mongolian; Manchu and Chinese. There were lots of buddha statues and one incredible, enormous one that stood in a three-tiered hall. People were burning incense in large barrels and the air was thick with smoke and the occasional chant from a lone monk sitting in a corner somewhere. Women threw themselves around in emphatic prayer gestures in front of various statues, and a couple of brown-robed monks posed for one another's photos using their mobile phones. An elderly monk in a yellow robe, wooly hat and a duffel coat shuffled around in the rain. There weren't too many tour groups today.

The audio guide assumed that we were very famliar with either regular buddhism or the Tibetan version, and unfortunately we didn't learn a lot. The exhibition about the Dalai Lama, one of the leaders of the religion, was all in Chinese. The temple was lovely but would have been more interesting with more information, I think.

It was still absolutely freezing but the rain had mostly stopped. We bought some gloves at a street stall (this morning the umbrella-sellers had been out in force, now it was the glove-vendors who were targetting the passing tourists who had been taken by surprise at the sudden cold weather) and then took a train out to the Temple of Heaven.

We've been caught out before by the size of Beijing and our map doesn't have a scale to avoid scaring us. So we shouldn't have been surprised that the single block we were intending to walk to the temple was actually a few miles, and that we actually entered the temple half-way along. It turned out that we chose a good point to get into the park, as there weren't that many other people around here. This was another gigantic complex with gardens and palaces and pavilions all around the place and yet more rennovations going on. The roads between significant parts of the park were amazing, long, straight passages lined with trees. There were cool birds here too - they looked like magpies in shape but were the colour of pigeons but with black heads. So we ambled along and looked at all the interesting bits.

There was the Fasting Palace which had an empty moat all round it and entrances over bridges, which was nice. A huge wooden building sat in the middle of the walled island, and implements and articles used by the emperor who lived here in the 1400s were on display. I think his name was Yongle, of the Ming dynasty, and Yongle Ming is such a cool name.

The walls of the palace were being renovated with plaster and a red pigment, and behind one of the walls we found a group of men with ancient wheelbarrows standing round a machine and stuffing hay into it. By some magic, the hay went into one side and red paint came out of the other directly into the wheelbarrows. We were trying to work it out but we realised that everyone had stopped their machines to stare at us, and that while we were standing there we wouldn't see the process in action. I think it was like the chocolate biscuit machine in Bagpuss where the mice made biscuits out of breadcrumbs and butterbeans. I've just eaten sugar. Can you tell?

More long paths took us through the park to a circular mound called the Circular Mound. It was a ring of marble platforms that afforded a great view over the city below once the tour groups had left. Then, just beyond that, was the Imperial Vault of Heaven and the echo wall, a circular pagoda with a lovely blue roof in a circular courtyard and girded by a large circular wall that was supposed to echo from one side to the other. Unfortuantely it was very crowded and hard to navigate without being trampled, so we had a quick glimpse and then went along a lovely raised walkway to the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, a slightly larger and less crowded version of the circular pagoda we'd just left. The walkeway was flanked by lovely blue flags today, and combined with the brigntening sky and the pale paving, it was a very refreshing walk and quite lovely. The big circular building at the end was very impressive and the blue glazed tiles on the three tiers of roofs were a gorgeous colour.

We walked back to the town centre from here and popped into the internet cafe for a second once it had got dark. Then we went to the duck restaurant for a great meal. We bypassed all the people waiting for supper, and we were shown straight to our table. The restaurant staff were very friendly and helpful but have what seems to be the standard Chinese habit of waiting while you look at the menu which is a bit intimidating. But we ordered half a duck between us and some vegetables, and all the trimmings.

The duck was a surprisingly small portion and we parceled the meat and onions and sauce in little pancakes and ate the whole lot very quickly. We discovered that the weird thing on the plate next to all the meat and the gorgeous crispy duck crackling (the whole dish was swimming in fat) was actually half a duck head, which I think was our share. It was turned over so that the eye didn't stare at us, but its innards did.

I thought I'd ordered another half because we weren't full yet, but it turned out that I'd just asked for confirmation that the portion was what we'd asked for. We didn't realise that until we tried again forty minutes later and she confirmed it again - this time we did order some more. We had a lovely meal and really enjoyed it, but I am looking forward to finding the crispy aromatic duck that I like so much one day!

On the way out, we asked the waitress just how many ducks they got through in a day - the restaurant was huge and always full. She said it was about eight hundred a day - that's a lot of ducks!