Beijing: 4 Awesome Days. Give Me a Year Before I'm Back!
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The tourist attractions in Beijing are indeed huge. If you have average energy, I suggest you think twice before engaging in this level of activity. Especially during national holidays like May Day, the tourist crowds are enormous and quite noticeable—Nanluoguxiang, for example, is particularly busy (a renowned old lane with an array of shops).
Let us discuss our travel itinerary:
- We arrived in Beijing in the late afternoon and checked into our hotel.
- In the afternoon we visited Nanluoguxiang, Yandiediexie Street (another interesting old street), and Houhai (a beautiful lake area).
- There's a famous mutton skewer snack near Houhai that tastes pretty good. You could give it a try.
- We also had huazhu (a local Beijing delicacy made by stewing pork entrails) and ice cream, which were really delicious.
- In the evening, we went to the Olympic venue areas—Bird's Nest and Water Cube. As for souvenirs, these places all offer similar items. Just casually take some photos on a quick visit.
- Important note:
- When visiting Bird's Nest or Water Cube at crowded times, if you're traveling with children, be sure to watch them closely so they don't get lost!
On the second day, our route took us to Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City (where the previous emperors used to live), and Jingshan Park (a small hill outside the north gate of the Forbidden City where you can see a panoramic view of the Forbidden City).
- The large number of visitors reveals some issues: everywhere are young children who start crying from time to time. With the vastness of the Forbidden City and the scorching heat of summer, children aren’t interested in historical and cultural stories. Therefore this makes travel especially tiring for kids.
- Travel Tips:
- When renting an audio tour machine (those portable audio guides that provide information about the attractions), you absolutely must check the earphone plug for any signs of imperfection. Any minor contact failure or damage must be immediately replaced, otherwise, it will seriously affect your touring experience!
- We rented an audio guide that worked fine at first, but it malfunctioned soon after we entered the site—the earphones had sound only in certain postures. Thus, the entire visit brought me so much trouble. Still, my child insisted on using the tour device whenever he saw one.
- The Forbidden City has free stamps to collect (though they are limited). I recommend bringing a journal for collecting them. There are many souvenir stores, so pick one or two larger ones to look around.
- Let me gripe for a bit:
- So many children running around the hallways and crowds, and parents just ignoring their actions. Really intolerable! A question must arise: What will these children turn out to be in the future?
- I understand how worn out adults become when children become exhausted with travel, but I strongly disapprove of giving up responsibility as parent; you can rest assured that this phenomenon occurs daily at popular tourist sites in Beijing.
- At the other end of the Forbidden City stands Jingshan Park.
- Although not very tall, people are always congested at the top, forming a long queue to reach the top.
- Getting a photo with a selfie stick takes hours—both going down and heading up. After a whole day under the sun and battling the smell of crowded crowds, everyone can only imagine what else it would feel like, hahaha.
- In the evening, we ate the famous "Da Yali" Peking roast duck restaurant. It was yummy! No wrong choice here, every bite hit the spot!
- However, there were many long queues. You could use their mini-app (similar to reserved seats) beforehand. We waited for an hour and a half.
- For me, initially planning returning to Tiananmen to watch flag-lowering ceremony was cancelled, hahaha, because life comes first.
On the third day, I visited Tsinghua University, one of China's best schools.
- More to complain about:
- While the campus is very beautiful, there are few students to be found, just tourists.
- Since we walked in with the kid instead of riding bicycles, the huge university grounds became very demanding for our legs.
- Those who say that bringing kids only once to visit Tsinghua won't get them admitted are right. Some people online say they've seen kids urinating and defecating anywhere, trampling the grass, etc. Fortunately, none of these happened to us personally.
- However, I cannot bear one thing more than others:
- When people line up to take photos of popular spots, crowds will surge ahead recklessly—to make way for their child to take a lead picture over another. Then nobody gets ahead. They just argue while holding on to positions.
- It felt quite distressful to an E person like me so after shouting “take turns! Every person gets shot individually, please return to the right after finishing”, perhaps most of people started being orderly. But nevertheless, there were still some completely ignoring etiquette, forcing their children into lines. Too tired to bear, though it's impossible to require every single visitor to behave properly.
- Then lunch time came.
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If you're talking about a year, I'm not going back for at least ten! My legs are absolutely shot.
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Haha, Beijing is great for a long-term stay. Visiting one attraction a week is just the right pace.
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My son and I absolutely adored Beijing! We were so sad when it was time to leave, we practically wanted to hug each other and cry. We'd sleep in, then visit just one or two places a day, and we made sure to eat at some of the top-rated restaurants. Everything was so delicious and fun!
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Hahahaha, I'm so curious, which restaurants did you try?
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Any hotel recommendations for Beijing, ladies?
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Ours wasn't too expensive. We stayed at the Yangguang Heyi Tarim Hotel in Beishatan. It's a bit of a walk to the subway, maybe 10-15 minutes, but because it's a bit further out, the environment was actually quite nice.