Blogs from Beijing, China, Asia - page 22

Another 12 months have passed since the Southern Africa trip and it's now only 9 days until we spread our wings to the East. A long flight to Beijing where we pick up a tour of Central China. Our original plan was to hop into Nepal for a few days but circumstances have resulted in a change of plan so we should only spend a few hours in Kathmandu airport before moving onto Delhi. There's been a fair bit of paperwork and visas for this trip so we're hoping it all goes smoothly, fingers def crossed. And it's gonna be hot and wet, and thats only the bars! Roll on BA39 to PEK on 20th June.... read more

Geo: 39.9165, 116.391 On our first full day in Beijing we visited Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. We had time to walk around, although not everywhere as this is the largest public square in the world, 100 acres, able to hold over a million people. I was expecting to pick up the energy of the square, but I just could not feel the presence of any history, the way I did in Berlin when I crossed the bricked lines in front of the Brandenburg Gate where the wall had stood. Here, although there were crowds of people, I felt nothing but the excitement of actually being in this place. There are also gardens planted here; flowers are everywhere in Beijing, adding beauty and a softness to an otherwise basic modern cityscape. Then we crossed into ... read more

It's our final day in Beijing and what better way to finish off our visit than with a trip to The Great Wall. This was a spectacular moment for our entire group. We all felt so privileged to be in the presence of The Great Wall. According to our tour guide, "Lily", we are all now Great Girls & Boys now that we have climbed The Great Wall. The trip was an hour and a half by bus outside of Beijing, and as we arrived to the park everyone was very anxious and eager to get to the top of the mountain where the wall stood. A short shuttle ride, a 10 minute walk uphill, and a 5 minute gondola ride got us to the top. I was surprised that the wall was so crowded with ... read more

This might be one of the craziest cities I have ever visited... mostly in a good way. The amount of people, smells, tradition, and traffic is beyond anyone's expectations. We landed on Wednesday afternoon on a bumpy flight from Seoul and soon after experienced the traffic congestion to the hotel. After arriving and checking in we traveled to a bizarre street market called the Silk Market. We used the subway to get there and that alone was an experience... a very crowded experience. We had to sandwich ourselves into the subway car along with the other 100 people that wanted to do so. Once we arrived at the market we traveled through the narrow path of the most outrageous smells in one area. Whiffs of braised octopus, noodles, fried scorpions, bats on a stick, steamed dumplings, ... read more

The Great Wall of China and the Beijing 2008 Olympic Park Our fantastic experiences and ticking yet another thing off our ‘Bucket List’ continued today. We were off to see the Great Wall of China, and the 2008 Olympic Games sites. First, we visited the Olympic Games site. The National Stadium or affectionately "Bird's Nest", in Chaoyang District is a major landmark and a lasting symbol of the 2008 Olympic Games. Two contemporary buildings in the District are remarkable landmarks: the CCTV Building (sometimes called "The Underpants" or "Bird Legs" by locals) and the World Trade Centre Tower III. Both are outstanding examples of contemporary architecture. It is a huge area and we only saw a small portion of the whole complex in the hour that was allocated to the visit. From there we drove to ... read more