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China travel guide: Beijing must-dos

From amazing food to breathtaking landscapes, the world's highest mountains to exotic cultures and the bright lights of Beijing, China is a vast and fascinating destination with so much to offer it's difficult to know where to start

We quizzed Peter Ellegard, writer of the AA Key Guide to China, on what to do, see and eat in China.

What food should travellers sample when in China?

It depends how adventurous they are! I try to go there with a very open mind and I'm pretty much game for anything, but I have tried a few things that turned my stomach. Things like camel hump, fried insect, fried scorpion, fried silkworms and even little birds.

Some of the food on offer would not appeal to a lot of people. What you see a lot of is chickens' feet. And these are delicacies; it's not just that they're eating anything, it's something they prize. One of the most memorable dishes for me was when I was an honoured guest sitting next to the Communist party secretary, and I was presented with a dish that had a chicken's head on it - just the head. And of course the whole table was looking at me as I sat there picking at the chicken's face.

But seriously, there are so many different regional cuisines, but each one has something that makes them very special. In the south you have Cantonese cuisine including Dim Sum, then in the east you've got Yung Chow fried rice - it comes from Yangzhou, in Jiangsu province, with lots of delicate flavours, and most dumplings come from that area.

Then Sichuan province is known for its fiery cuisine, where you also get very spicy and tangy food with a lot of flavour. And then of course there are favourites like aromatic duck. It's worth trying every cuisine, and you can find them all in Beijing. Experiment, be bold, be brave!

Which would you say are the top five must-sees in Beijing?

The Forbidden City; the Great Wall, which is just outside Beijing but you can easily do it in half a day or a day trip; then you have the Summer Palace, which is definitely worth seeing and isn't always on people's itineraries; the Temple of Heaven, which is a fascinating place and one of my favourites; and the Emperors' Tombs, which are on the way to the Great Wall.

What do you think the Olympic Games are doing for China's tourism industry?

I think the games are making China much more visible to the outside world - it's always been a very unknown destination and people have been wary or even afraid of it. But the Olympics is firing a curiosity about China that people want to satisfy.

The TV coverage that's already starting will increase people's desire to know more. I think people have a stereotyped view of china; they see it as being just a mass of people. And when you go there, yes there is that, and when you land in Beijing and see the streets full of people and bicycles and cars it can be overwhelming, but when you go to other places you see a totally different side of China.

Do you think the smog in Beijing will affect the Olympic athletes?

They're worried about that and certainly in the summer the heat is going to be a factor. They will be banning traffic at the time, bringing in a lot of measures to reduce pollution and they're moving some factories out away from the city. So they're taking measures to alleviate it.

Smog's not unique to Beijing either, Beijing does have problems with pollution but it's no different to other big cities - it happened in Athens and Atlanta, and London may well face the same situation so I think it's a little unfair to single out Beijing.

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