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Published: April 18th 2015
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Greetings from Beijing, China
After a fairly uneventful journey with two seven hour flights and a four hour stopover in Dubai we were delighted to see a little man with a piece of paper with Chris’ name on , our transport to the hostel. If I was to do the top ten tips for travel this would be one of them. You have rarely had much sleep, just got through immigration and the rugby scrum that is baggage reclaim and the last thing you need is running the gambit of airport taxi drivers; they will invariably overcharge you and try and scam you into going to a different hotel/hostel and of course in some places add in the language barrier and your hotel or hostel transfer becomes worth its weight in gold. Only once have we been let down in our six years of travel.
Our hostel, Dragon King, is in a Hutong the traditional Beijing architecture with mainly single storey buildings with a series of small lanes. Lots have been bulldozed to make way for modern high rise which is a real shame, but as the state owns everything they can do what they
want.
So here we are in Beijing, a city of 1.6 billion people, horrendous traffic and pretty poor air quality but our gateway to the Great Wall of China. The place is incredibly clean, people put their litter in bins and there is an army of cleaners on the streets and the subway. We have had five nights here and seen some amazing sights, Tiananmen Square might be big and will tight security but I couldn’t think beyond the atrocities of recent years. There are police and army patrolling, cameras everywhere and in the surrounding streets reinforcements and even a bomb disposal unit. Definitely not a highlight for me.
We booked our trip to the wall through the hostel and we left on a chilly and breezy morning, which cleared the smog. It was 90 minutes to the wall and we saw a little of the outskirts of the city. Still incredibly clean but some stuff was hidden behind walls and we did see some people sleeping rough or in makeshift shelters. There were also work parties digging holes and the demeanour of the people gave the impression that they were not workers being
paid and they were in “uniform”.
The wall is absolutely amazing and we got the cable car up to one of the watchtowers, as we wanted to save our energy for walking on the wall. The views were stunning and you got some idea of the scale of the wall, although 6,000 km is not comprehensible!! As we got to the wall there were little flurries of snow that added to the magic. It is a fabulous construction and we were at a part that had been restored. We had about two hours walking on the wall and some sections are pretty steep so it is not for the unfit!! Afterwards we had lunch with the group on the tour and had a great selection of dishes served with rice. The wall was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G
Monday we went to the Forbidden City to find it closed, nothing in the guide book to give a clue and several other nationalities also there suggesting it is a recent change. So instead we went to visit the Lama temple, the focus of Buddhism in Beijing , converted from a palace the architecture is stunning and quite peaceful amidst
the hustle and bustle of the city. There is an 18m statue of Buddha, carved from a single piece of wood-it's in the Guinness Book of Records!!We also went to the area where the bell and drum towers are but didn’t go in. This was the way that time was kept in cities, one used in the morning and the other at night.
Tuesday was a bit of a lost day sightseeing but we went to seek out Beijing’s signature dish Peking duck. We found a place on the edge of Behai Lake and ordered our duck. There was a 50 minute wait but it was comfy and air-conditioned so we didn’t mind. The whole duck is then carved ready to eat with pancakes sauce etc. Now many of you reading this will have had Peking duck in your local Chinese but this was on a different level, a little fatty for my liking so I took off some of the skin but so tasty. I also managed to get the rest of the carcass, I had watched a Chinese couple get theirs!!
Not far from the hostel was a great little local restaurant, many Chinese restaurants have pictures of their dishes on the wall. This one had one menu with some descriptions in English. They spoke no English and we know 2 words of Chinese but we just pointed and lo and behold delicious dishes arrived at the table. The food was always piping hot and had been freshly cooked. The flavours were fabulous and the most we paid was 40 Yuan, about £4.50.
Wednesday we finally went to the Forbidden City, we packed up our stuff, ate breakfast in the hostel and put our bags in the luggage store and off we went. The Beijing underground is many things, crowded, efficient, and cheap and a marvellous way to get fit. Every transit stop requires you to walk miles to get from one line to the other. If there are two escalators they will invariably be going down when you are going up. However compared to being over ground on the crowded roads it is the only way to get around. You soon learn the etiquette, get on and go in the middle of the carriage, always face the door then when it is your stop next move towards the door –all of the time engrossed in your iphone or Samsung phone.........oh sorry that bit is only the Chinese as we have neither!! Never ever worry about barging people out of the way just go for it!!
This was excellent training for the Palace, a fabulous spectacle but absolutely mobbed with Chinese tour groups, the red hats, the checked trilbys, and the white baseball caps all following a tour guide with a flag. The buildings are stunning and some of the exhibits were fabulous, the clocks and jewellery in particular. We spent about four hours in total and it was well worth the hustle and bustle. We had lunch back at our hostel and then waited till 6 to get our taxi to Beijing North train station.
Chris had booked the tickets on line and we needed to pick them up for our night-sleeper to Xian. The traffic was horrendous and so was the pollution –except it wasn’t pollution it was the worst sandstorm to hit Beijing since 2002!! You could have cut the air with a knife it was so bad. The taxi took forever and the train station was the biggest I have ever seen and chaos does not begin to describe it. We eventually found the correct ticket office, there are at least three but then it wasn’t obvious where the trains where!! I asked a young lad and we finally got through having done one security check, bag X ray and a ticket check. Our day bags must be radioactive the number of times they have been X rayed. Each train is allocated a waiting room........yeh well a massive big space enclosed by stall selling essentials for the train journey ahead and some seats and mainly masses of people on the floor surrounded by baggage. The Chinese do not travel light!!
Our 8.50 train to Xian was fine the four berth sleeper was cosy and I slept reasonably well considering as well as Chris there was a German guy opposite and a Chinese guy on the top bunk opposite Chris. The bedding was clean and there was a little washroom and a western style toilet, squatting at speed is not easy!!
We got to Xian at 8am, met by someone from the hostel and then our room was ready so a shower was the first priority. So Xian, walled city and the opportunity to see the Terracotta Warriors-but that is for next time.
I should have done a bit of preparation before the trip as I did not download a vpn so, Google is banned, there is no Facebook and as my previous blog is Google I have had to set up this new one.
Hope this finds you well and till next time
Norma xx
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