My time in Beijing – The Great Wall!

I was lucky to be chosen to travel to China with some of my colleagues to do our ‘Grand Tour of China’ which is part of our Bucket List Trips to check out the tour and make sure all OK for our customers doing this trip next year!  All I can say is ‘you won’t be disappointed’

We flew directly from Heathrow to Beijing on 14 August with BA from terminal 5, the flight was 10 hours but went pretty quickly as it was late afternoon so after watching a couple of movies and dinner I slept a bit. We arrived in Beijing local time approx 09.30am.  China is 8 hours ahead of us.  Gina – one of our colleagues was lucky enough to be upgraded to Club Class so I & Lyndy stayed in economy but the staff gave us champagne!

            

On arrival you have to go through immigration after using machines to do your fingerprints, these were a bit temperamental and some took longer than others so be prepared.

Andy our guide met us at arrivals and took us to the coach which was a bit of a walk as quite a large airport.  He had cold bottles of water ready for us which was a lovely touch and well needed.

The traffic in Beijing is a bit like the M25 – lots of it so a 20-minute journey can take an hour or so, it took approx 1 hour 30 mins to get to our hotel.  We stayed at The Qianmen Jianguo Hotel in a business room.  The hotel was authentic and had a lovely atmosphere when you walked in. We checked in and headed up to find our room which was lovely.  We had 3 nights here in total but didn’t unpack as would be on the go so just lived out of our cases as you do when touring.

              

The only thing about this hotel is the bathrooms were pretty small but it was fine.

After we had dropped our bags off in the room we headed off to do some hotel visits around Beijing and saw 4 other hotels we may also be using on our Bucket List to China next year.

  1. Fairmont Beijing
  2. Conrad Hotel
  3. Mercure (didn’t like this one)
  4. Poly Plaza Hotel

My favourite was the Conrad so far as large spacious rooms and bathrooms.

We went back to the hotel to shower, change and go for dinner.  Andy took us to a local restaurant where we had a variety of Chinese dishes to share – it was a lovely meal but we were pretty tired so went straight back to the hotel & had a glass of wine before bed – ready for the next day’s adventure…..  ‘The Great Wall of China’

Can I just say – I love a glass of ‘Pinot’ but the Chinese don’t really do wine so didn’t have much, as these blogs go on you will see me happy when I do find somewhere that sells wine – ha ha!

We had an early start with breakfast at 6 am and leaving at 7 am as it was very hot & humid in August and the ‘Great wall’ would be very busy later on so better to get there early. The drive was approx 1.5 hours.  We visited the ‘Juyongguan’ section of the wall as the coaches can park quite close so easier & quicker to get onto the wall.

We needed the toilet after the coach journey and this was my first experience of a local Chinese toilet – well I’d heard about these before I went and was prepared with tissues as not all supply them so make sure you have some in your bag!

Don’t be alarmed, not all toilets are like this, they do have western toilets in most places which will have a picture on the door so you know which is which but what an experience…

Andy took us to the main area and explained a few details about the wall then we had 2 hours to explore and climb up as far as we could. I can definitely say it is not easy to walk up as lots of uneven steps so not for the faint-hearted or less mobile.  Myself & my colleague Gina did climb up to the 1st tower which was approx 350 steps and took about 20 minutes.  You need a sunhat & plenty of water as the temperature was around 30′ at 9 am in the morning & gets more humid as the day goes on.

The Great Wall was originally built by Qin Shi Huang – the 1st Emporer of China. The wall stretches from the northern countryside Gobi Desert to the west into the Bohai Sea in the east.  It is the longest wall in the world and was used to protect China from Normadic tribes.  It dates back to the Ming Dynasty & is over 700 years old.

I was pretty overwhelmed to actually be stood on ‘The Great Wall’ and loved this experience immensely.

Here are a few photos to show we did it!

       

I would recommend taking a clean dry Top or T-shirt as you are very hot & sweaty after the climb so it’s nice to change before getting back on the coach.  Andy our guide gave us this tip and it was very welcome.

After we climbed back down we headed to the coffee bar for a well-deserved drink after purchasing a little memento of our visit!

I climbed ‘The Great Wall of China’ ………..

I did video the stairs coming down so here you can see just how steep it was…

After the Great Wall adventure we headed to a Jade Factory to have a look around and see how the Jade is made, then we were followed around by staff trying to sell us, Jade, – it is very beautiful but quite pricey so we just bought some bracelets which were on offer – buy 2 get 1 free so the 3 of us had one each & split the cost.

We had lunch here too which was well needed after all the climbing we had done. A nice selection of dishes again – I was getting quite good with a pair of chopsticks!!

So this was the 1st day of our tour – next time I will tell you all about Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City & Temple of Heaven…

We have availability on our April 2019 & September 2019 tours so if you fancy doing this, give me a call 0330 303 8208 or email me at [email protected] for more information.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


About Me

My name is Barbara Hopley (my real surname is now Neale) but most people call me ‘Babs’ – doesn’t sound as old as I’m not really that old. I am passionate about Cruise and have over 30 years of experience of travel knowledge. After working for various travel companies I…

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