China #5 (Final) - CCTV Tower & Subway Fun

I think it's about time to wrap up my China posts...so this will be the last one remembering our trip to Beijing.

On our last full day in Beijing, Kami and I headed to the CCTV tower. I kind of have this thing...in each of the capital cities I've been to (Vilnius, Prague, Seoul), I've been to the TV tower...so when Kami and I were talking about going to Beijing, the TV tower was one of the top things on my to-do list. Maybe I'll get to Tokyo's tower before leaving Asia...we'll see. So here are a few pictures from the TV tower in Beijing. The air was pretty nasty over the city, so I couldn't take too many 'city' shots from the top.

Sometimes the English translations aren't the most accurate.

On a totally different note...I love subways!! I'm not talking about the sandwich shop...I'm talking about the form of public transportation. I have to say...they are efficient and I love going to cities that have subways. Beijing had a nice subway system from a tourist's point-of-view. We were able to get where we needed to go and very cheaply. They only charge 2 RMB (about $0.30) for a ticket to any line, any number of transfers, and time limit. It's great!! Here are some pictures from the subway line.

The subways were packed...yikes!

Can you find Kami?

Some of the stops even had pretty artwork.

So concludes our trip to Beijing. It was a good trip...great memories were made and lots of pictures were taken. I enjoyed my time in China's capital city and hope you can, too, one day!

China #4 - THE GREAT WALL

Of course if you go to China, you much see the Great Wall. After a little research, we decided to go to the Mutianyu portion of the wall. This decision was mostly based on the fact that they had a slide (toboggan) that we could take down the mountain after walking on the Great Wall. I mean, a slide...the decision couldn't be an easier one!

Getting to Mutianyu was a little interesting, so here are a few details in case you ever want to go. If you don't, just skip to the next paragraph! We took Line 1 of the subway to the Dongzhimen stop and went to the big bus transfer station. At the bus transfer station, look for bus #916. There will probably be a long line and the ticket will be about $2 (11 RMB). You'll take this bus for about an hour out of Beijing. Here's where it gets interesting. About an our into our trip, we made a stop and this man came on the bus and told us to get off so we could take us to the Great Wall. It happened so fast and we were a little confused, but it turned out to be what we needed to do. This man took us right where we needed to be (it was about 30-45 minutes away) and waited for us to finish our time on the wall so he could take us back to the bus stop. It seemed a little sketchy at first, but it turned out to be good...this is why I wanted to tell you in case you decide to go. The 'taxi' trip ended up costing us about $11 (70 RMB) each, which I think is pretty darn good.

Ok, back to the Wall. Once we arrived at the Great Wall, we took a cable car up the mountain so we could actually walk on the Wall. It's incredible to think about the Great Wall and how it is built on mountain tops...so not only did these people building this incredible wall, they had to climb mountains to do so. We opted to take the cable car up instead of climbing..it was a hot, nasty day so it would have been gross! Here are some shots once we were on the Great Wall.

After walking this section of the Great Wall, you can either take a gondola down or you can ride the toboggan. We were super excited for the slide!! It doesn't seem to be overly-advertised, so we were glad to read about it online before we went. If we hadn't, we wouldn't have known about it.

Some shoes that these girls were wearing shocked me. I was in tennis shoes and my feet still hurt...I can't even imagine being in flats.

Here's Kami tobogganing in front of me.

So was the Great Wall really that great?? I'd say so. It's really incredible to see and to think about. I can't imagine being a part of the construction...I bet it was crazy. If you get a chance, definitely go down the slide...it's a great cap for the experience.

China #3 - Acrobatic Show & Olympic Green

After a day of touring around Beijing, Kami and I decided to go to an acrobatic show. This is a pretty famous thing for visitors to see, and we were interested too. We booked our tickets through our hotel and made our way to the show!

The show was quite interesting. It was like the things you see on tv...except it was in person. I still can't believe some of the things they do with their bodies...they're so flexible. We weren't supposed to take pictures during the show, but here are a few I managed to capture.

Our show was at the Beijing Theatre

This is a really cool thing to watch. I'm not sure what it's called but we saw it a few months ago at Lotte World. It's really neat.

This GIRL had some legs of steel. She wasn't just holding a 20-something year old on her feet, also a huge heavy pot. She twisted him around too. She must do some major leg presses!

The swirling plates!

All of the performers saying good-bye!

After the show, we took a taxi to Olympic Green since we were in the area. This was probably of my personal favorites. It was crazy to think about the fact that the Olympics were there less than a year ago. It was also a treat to go at night so we could see all of the buildings lit up. I think most of the pictures are pretty self-explanatory.

The Water Cube was awesome!

The Bird's Nest...it was pretty incredible to see!

And a video for your view enjoyment!

Overall, it was a great night and I was excited to see the show and Olympic Green. Until next time!!

China #2: The Forbidden City

Hello again!

DAY 2 CONTINUED:

After Tiananmen Square and the garden (see previous post), Kami and I headed to the Forbidden City...also called the Palace Museum. I definitely wasn't prepared for the size of this place....it was gigantic!! There were tons of people there checking out the place along with us! This is certainly one of the biggest tourist attractions in Beijing...for good reason. Here are some shots and a video:

The detail on the temples amazes me...it's so intricate.

This is a stone carving going up to a temple. Crazy to think about someone doing this.

Traditional wear...sexy huh?

This is my favorite shot from the day.

A huge picture of Mao Zedong at the Tiananmen Gate.

All over town, there were young soldiers marching around.

Here is a little video from inside the Forbidden City.

Alright, that's all for now. More to come later!

China #1: Arrival + Tiananmen Square + Zhongshan Park

So begins my series of posts about my trip to Beijing!! It was a really fun trip and it was really nice just being a tourist again. The last two countries I've been to (before China) have been for living, so this is the first time in a while that I've just been a tourist! It was nice! Alright, here goes:


Warning: I'm going to include some details that may not interest you, but just in case some comes to get info off my site, I want to give as much as I can.

DAY 1:

Our trip began on Wednesday night after Kami and I got off of work. We took the bus from Tongyeong to Seoul and ended up getting there around 3am. We were pretty tired, but excited too. Then we took a taxi from Seoul to the airport and arrived to the airport before most of the workers. We were zonked and then the news that our flight had been delayed did not help. We were supposed to depart at 8:10am and it was pushed back to 2:00pm due to weather in Beijing. Our first thoughts were ones of exhaustion. We figured we'd need to find a bench at the airport and plant ourselves there for 6 hours. Little did we know, that wouldn't be the case. If you ever get the chance to fly China Southern Airlines, I definitely recommend it. Once we found out our flight was delayed, we were informed that we'd be bussed to a hotel where we could rest before our flight. We were quite shocked. Can you imagine this happening at home? I can't! So it ended up that we were able to nap comfortably in a nice hotel for a few hours before we departed for Beijing. It was a nice surprise since we were so tired from our midnight trip to Seoul.


Anyways, we finally departed, feeling rested and excited. We arrived to Beijing within just a few hours and just prayed we wouldn't have to be quarantined. Since all of the Swine Flu stuff, China makes sure you're quite healthy before entering their country. We both passed and finally stepped foot into China!

And where was our first stop...you guessed it!! Starbucks!! Yummy!

When we arrived in Beijing, it was raining quite hard so we were a bit worried that it would be like that for our whole trip. Thankfully, it wasn't! After we got to our hotel, we went looking for a place to get some dinner. And what is your guess for that?? McDonald's of course! Please don't think we were just being typical American tourists that only go to American places...we actually don't have Starbucks or McDonald's in our South Korean town. Anywho, after a delicious meal, we headed back to our hotel to prepare for the next day of being tourists!

DAY 2:

Our second day in Beijing was a busy one! Our first tourist stop was Tiananmen Square. Some of you may know about this, but I didn't know much before I went. I still don't know too much...except for what my guide book and Kami told me. The guidebook called it the "center of Communism"...and Kami told me about a protest against Communism that took place there in the 1980's. I gathered from both sources that lots of history took place in Tiananmen Square. Essentially, this was a huge square packed with tons of people. There was a memorial building you could go into but we chose not to since the line was insanely long. We did take some pictures though...of course! Here are a few:

After walking around the square, we headed over to the Forbidden City...which is just across the street. Before entering the Forbidden City, we walked through Zhongshan Park. It was quite a pretty place. Here are some pics:
Ok that is all for this post. More to come!!