I had more pictures of the area south of the mud, which features a nice park full of old people fishing despite admonisions to the contrary (any fishing in China requires a permit). They also suggested I wash off in the creek below, as many people were swimming there to escape from the summer heat, but I decided against it. Unfortunately, these pictures were deleted along with over a hundred I took of us leaving Beijing West Station and first getting onto our express sleeper train to Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia when, in an attempt to see how much memory remained on my camera, I accidentally reformatted my memory card. Sorry about that. On the bright side, this AWESOME train was on a different card I had already downloaded. I think it's an official train, since it's A. spotless, unlike the rather scuzzy looking stuff that usually uses this line, B. only this car, and C. doesn't sport a Chinese Railway logo but a shiny hammer and sickle.
EAP China! Robert Klein.