Beijing

  Each trip I took in China was different...some very different; like going to pick up my family in Shanghai. On this day I would go on the bus from Huaibei, Anhui to Xuzhou, Jiangsu where I would catch a 6 plus hour fast train ride to Shanghai. The cigarette smoking around and in the bus/train stations was unbearable at times. Once I got a hotel I familiarized myself with the subway line and the area around the hotel; on the next day I was to meet my wife and daughter who were visiting China for the first time. After a sleep in the hotel we made our way to the fast train station and boarded a train to Suzhou, Anhui; once there we negotiated with a taxi driver for a ride to Huaibei; for 100 RMB ($14) the driver took all the back routes to avoid the 10 RMB toll fee on the highway. We sped through villages on dusty, rutted roads, but made it to our destination; it is a wonder that the car survived the trip, as the driver seemed to hit every hole. We and our bags were filthy from the dust, the temperature was 38 degrees, it was time for a shower.

  After 2 days we took a 7 hour fast train to Beijing, we would arrive at 9pm with no particular plan...not such a good idea. We disembarked the train at the South Beijing Station, it was huge, like landing at a big airport. We had "Qianmen St." written in Chinese on a paper that we gave to the taxi driver, who did not know a word of English, there was supposed to be many hotel choices there. We were dropped off by Tiananmen Square which would be very familiar within a day but this was 10 pm. The first couple of hotels that I went in did not have hospitable staff so we finally boarded into the tricycle of a guy who had been hounding us and he took us the Qianmen St. where we found a Super 8 Hotel. By 11:10 pm we were very tired but finally settled in a room at a hotel with very friendly workers and could plan our Beijing tourist attractions.

  In the morning we walked past Tiananmen Square to the Forbidden City which is viewed by most tourists. At 600 years old (built in 1406), the Forbidden City is the worlds largest ancient palace; there are 980 buildings with almost 10,000 rooms, the place is beyond huge. Some 200,000-1 million workers were said to have built this palace that was inhabited by 24 emperors.

                           

                           

                           

    We covered every corner that was open to the public and it took many hours to do so, I was surprised at the enormity of this attraction. In the evening while the girls were resting in the hotel I hit the streets and subway to find an English street map at a book store; not very many people could speak English.

  The next day in Beijing we visited the Temple of Heaven which was another huge complex.

                                        

                                

   The 2.7 million sq metre site was first built in 1420 and used by emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasty for worship. The buildings were impressive but I was amazed at the size of the park, with it's tree's and grass area's, nice to see all this green space in the middle of such a large city. The construction craze was rampant within the 20 years of construction of the Forbidden City and Temple of Heaven. I was getting a bit tired of being the smoker police as so many men in the hotel lobby and restaurants lit up, even with the "no smoking" signs. Many people nodded their approval and some even clapped; if only they could stand up for their rights.

   On our next day we hired a driver with his car for 500 RMB and rode to some Ming Tombs which were just okay; the highlight there was the underground palace at Dingling Mausoleum. We then headed off to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall which was our main destination of the day; about one hour outside of Beijing. First built around 550-577, this first ever section of the Great Wall I saw was in very good shape in the area where most of the tourists were.

                                          

                           

  We traveled in both directions until the end of the public access. The girls stayed put while I ventured past the preserved area and got some good photo's of more dilapidated sections of the wall;

                          

There were absolutely no people near the ends of the wall and the wall covered some 2.5 kms from end to end which meant we covered 5 kms. Climbing up and down the wall was a lot like climbing a mountain, there were some steep sections; we stopped at 23 watch towers and had a very positive experience on this first Great Wall venture.

   The next day my wife and daughter wanted to take a break from the hours of walking and climbing so I ventured out myself to the Badaling section of the Great Wall. I took the #2 subway line, then the #919 bus 50 kms to the most common wall section for Chinese Nationals. About 2 kms before the main gate we passed the Shuigan section of the wall and arrived at a crowded parking lot. The Badaling section was built between 1368-1644 during the Ming Dynasty. I was glad that my wife missed this part of the wall because there were so many people pushing, throwing garbage;

                                      

                            

 there were several piles of human excrement in stairwells and corners; seems there is no pride at such tourist sites.

                             

 I fought the crowds, who did not venture far, and covered the whole 12 kms of wall that is available for the tourist. The weather could have been better as the visibility was limited but it was good to be covering more kms of the almost 9,000 kms of wall in China. Parts of this section of the wall rise 1,000 metres above sea level; many sections were built to keep out the invading Mongols, led in part by Genghis Khan.

  The last day in Beijing I walked over to Tiananmen Square at 6 am, and stood there taking in the panorama that included the gates to the Forbidden City, the National Museum, Tiananmen Rostrum (built in 1417), and the Memorial Hall of Chairman Mao; there were very few people but by 6:30 there were many locals.

                       

                       

By 7:30 crowds started to form a line outside the Memorial Hall of Chairman Mao, a ritual for thousands of Chinese daily.

  After I got back from "The Square" my daughter and I went to the Baiyun Temple which was built in 739. We then went to the Tianning Temple, which has a pagoda that was built in the 12th century; although it was showing it's age it was still great to see.

                                             

                            

After that cultural site we went to the Niusie Mosque which was built in 996; this is the oldest and largest mosque in Beijing and it houses a 300 year old copy of the Koran. We were both tired from the walking but had enough in the tank to stop by the Cultural Museum, it was just okay.

  Beijing had a lot to offer the tourist, except for clean breathing air. One would figure that the brochures and post cards have photo's that were either taken in the winter when the odd day has some blue sky or the photo's are altered. We headed out in the morning to the Nanyuan Airport, which used to be a military airport. Our next destination was to be Inner Mongolia.