Beijing – My Gateway To China

I recently returned from a fact finding trip to China for our hugely popular Grand Tour of China Bucket List Holiday.  My first stop was a 3 day stay in Beijing (Peking) which was packed with visiting the iconic places of interest for travellers including the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square & The Temple of Heaven.  (More on these later…)

DAY 1  

My exciting adventure began at London Heathrow where I met my fellow cruise.co.uk travellers, and boarded a British Airways flight for our 10hr journey.   My first big surprise was that I had been singled out for a free upgrade to Club Class! Which I gracefully accepted and was shown to my fantastic FlatBed seat and settled down to enjoy the flight!  My fellow passengers were compensated with free bubbly for the duration of the flight so they were well pleased!

10 hours later, around 9:30am local time,  and after a thoroughly relaxing and restful sleep, we arrived in Beijing.  I’ve got to say the airport is huge! and from disembarking the aircraft to baggage claim took around an hour!   My first surprise was the Fingerprint booths which all passengers have to undergo.

20 automated fingerprinting booths have been set up before passengers go through passport control. After the fingerprints have been taken you receive a receipt that you then have to present at passport control.  Passengers refusing to undergo fingerprinting will be refused entry into China.  It was a bit of a faff, as you had to get your fingers in the exact position on the screen, which after a 10hr flight was a bit frustrating!

Once through Passport Control and presenting our Immigration Cards, we had a short wait for our luggage before meeting our guide Andy for the transfer to our Hotel Qianmen Jianguo Beijing, which took approximately 90mins as Beijing traffic was (and always is) very heavy! The hotel was I would say ‘Traditional’, rooms were light and airy, with ‘bijou’ bathrooms, but more than adequate for our needs.  After dropping off our bags, we set off to inspect a few of the hotels earmarked for the Grand Tour.   Conrad Hilton, Mercure, Poly Plaza & the Fairmont.

Our Hotel in Beijing

Then time for lunch!   Andy took us to a lovely authentic Chinese Restaurant where we were served a ‘small banquet’ of different dishes, which included vegetarian options.

He also gave us some fascinating facts and helpful tips about Beijing & Chinese people.  Like did you know? Chinese people are born aged 1yr!  As they include the time spent in the womb!

Beijing has a very low crime rate, and its very safe for tourists to walk around the city.  Locals face severe punishment if tourists are victims of crime.  So an excellent deterrent!

Transport in Beijing is in a word,  madness! People mainly travel by car, bicycle and scooters, as well as buses and trams. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the traffic layout, and it looks like ‘everyone for themselves’! Complete chaos to us Westerners!  All signs though are in Chinese and English including the subway, which is a great help.

After a very busy day, time for a quick nightcap and an early night, as we were up early the next morning to visit The Great Wall!

Tune in next time to read about my trek up the Wall!