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Published: November 17th 2012
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After a rushed trip to the airport to see Martin on his flight back to Australia via Hongkong I had the afternoon to hang around in Beijing prior to my train back to Jinan.
Subway loop line 2 takes you to Dongzhimen, and then transfer to the airport express line, easy to follow with trains every minute or so on the subway and every ten minutes or so on the airport express line.
Quick Starbucks coffee in the arrival hall and I was ready to face the world.
Too much to see and so little time; it was a toss-up between Forbidden Palace, Olympic park and Beijing zoo and the zoo won.
Beautiful clear blue skies and winter sunshine made this a great choice. After rain and snow the smog stays away for a couple of days.
The zoo is on subway line 1, with its own station clearly marked, follow the zoo exit signs in the subway and when you get out turn left and the entrance is almost behind the subway station. This is the North West entrance.
Y15 entry is a pittance to pay for this
beautiful well laid out park, gardens and zoo. It started its life as a garden in the early 1900’s and was made a zoo in the 1950’s with the Reptile house as one of its first exhibit areas.
There are numerous signs in English, maps, seats, eating areas, clean toilets and immaculate paths and gardens right in the middle of the city.
Loved the huge lake in the middle with the fantastic amount of water birds; geese, swans, ducks of all sorts. You just do not see water birds in any of the lakes and canals when you are out and about; all these birds are farmed and eaten under normal circumstances.
The Reptile house is completely undercover, near the southwest corner and had a magnificent collection of snakes, lizards, crocodiles, etc. on 3 levels.
I really wanted to see the giant Pandas and this is located in the North-west area, another Y5 entry fee. (1 Australia dollar!!!)
There seemed to be at least 6-8 pandas that I could see on display, of various sizes in well laid out environments. There were some very natural looking indoor areas for what appeared
Exit and turn left
Northwest entry right behind you almost the younger ones where there was a pair together and outdoor natural areas for the larger ones. As they are solitary animals there was only 1 panda in each outdoor area, happily chowing down on a pile of fresh bamboo.
Parts of the giant panda’s area are very new and were built for the Olympic Games in 2008.
Some of the other zoo animals were in smallish caged environments, but none were exhibiting really stressed behaviour.
The giant brown bears had the people absolutely conned; they sat and pawed the air and looked cute and people threw down food scraps which they sniffed at and looked bored with. I’m not sure if these bears were performing bears in a past life or they have learnt this behaviour; they seemed really intelligent animals that were doing the best they could to interact and make their life meaningful in the environment they were in. They are huge, 3 metres tall, small car size.
The penguin house is a bit of a waste of Y10 entry fee, with some very bored looked penguins swimming around in a tank and one walking on the concrete area.
The Chinese need to be reminded of zoo etiquette of not tapping the glass cages or shining lights into the nocturnal displays; they were not enough signs or attendants to discourage this behaviour.
Even if you are not a zoo lover you have to remind yourself that many of these animals you see in these places are threatened or near extinction in the wild and it’s only through places like zoos that they can breed and still be there for people to see. Beijing zoo has an obvious program of breeding and environment protection.
In the south east corner of the zoo is the Beijing Aquarium. Entry is Y120 so I did not bother with it.
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Paul Staples
non-member comment
Still fascinated
Dear Rosemary, I am still thoroughly enjoying your blog. Thanks for going to so much trouble. I thought of you today-we went to the Make It yourself market at the racetrack, and noone had jams and pickles- you must be the boss-cocky there! It was so busy-we missed the macaroons by being 40 minutes late! It is getting very hot here, so your cold stories resonate! Jenny played at Bucasia this morning, and I sang with Patty Cawte, which is why we were late for the market! We had some German friends stay with us last week. Eungella and the platypuses were quite the hit! I learned to make a very good rhubarb cake with Dagmar showing me how! Have to grow rhubarb now! Cheers Paul