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Beijing, China daily Blog and Journal.
Travel Writing, Blog, Travelogue
(June 28 - July 15, 2005)
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| June 28 |
Beijing. We made a reservation at Far East Youth Hostel
through www.hostelworld.com.
and it was recommended by Elaine and Rachel who we met in the Wulingyuan
National Park. We
also chose this hostel because it was located in a Hutong (old Chinese
neighborhood), walking distance to Tianiman square, and it had wireless internet.
Well it turned out that it did not have wireless internet and we had to
connect via their router but the other things are true. When we arrived we rolled the bikes in
the lobby and the assistant manager said that she did not want our bikes
inside, we said we were not going to leave our bikes outside, not a good
first introduction. We ended up putting our bikes in the courtyard
across the street. The bikes were secure the entire time we were
at the hostel however I would not call this a bike friendly hostel
simply because I prefer my bike in my room.
Other than that we really enjoyed staying at the Far East, the staff was
pleasant and spoke English and the courtyard was a great place to
hang out and meet other tourists. We met a Dutch man who now lives
in Mongolia and Lloyd an American who is working for the World Wildlife
Fund, we will post some of his photos from Beijing. We also met
Gloria a graduate student in Beijing studying international business,
she taught me a lot about the Chinese culture. |
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| June 29 |
We quickly went to work looking for a place to change
our L tourist visa to a F business visa. We found Vista Productions
advertising in a magazine called "That's Beijing"
on the internet. We went to their office to met them and decide
whether we were going to give them our passport. We gave them our
passport and they said that it would take at least 7 business days to
complete the process. Our F visa which is good for 6 months, with no additional
entries cost 1360 ($170) Yuan each. It took a bit longer to get our visa
back then expected, we picked up our passports on July 13, 11 business days later.
Overall it was a lot cheaper for us to get our new Visa here in Beijing than
to fly to Hong Kong and get a new Visa there. |
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| June 30 |
We wandered around the Hutongs of Beijing with Lloyd
who we met in the Youth hostel. The hutongs are an old style of
living in Beijing that is being replaced by the modern new high rise.
The hutong is a close knit neighborhood where every knows everyone.
Each house has living quarters and a courtyard while the bathroom is
shared with the neighbors. These public bathrooms are being
renovated and even have a western style seat in some of them. Most
of the older ones I would not go in. Everything and anything
happens on the streets of the hutong, I saw grandma pushing a homemade
baby stroller, grandpa walking the dog, men working right outside
their door fixing bicycles and playing mahjong. The streets are
narrow and an ideal place to explore by bicycle. The car has made
inroads into the hutong but usually they are stuck in traffic waiting
for a pedicab ( bicycle taxi) or bike loaded with goods to go by. |
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| July 1 - 15 |
Aunt Joan arrived in Beijing on July 7, she is on a
three week tour of China. I want to
say thanks for bringing our gear to my Aunt Joan who recently met us in Beijing.
When Aunt Joan wrote and told us she was coming I was elated. First,
because I had not seen her in a long time and second because I think
China is a great place to travel. As time went by we realized that she
could bring us some things from the States that are hard to get here.
The top of my list was medicine like Neosporin. Going to a Chinese
pharmacy is like going to a herb store and not being able to read the
signs. I loved all the herbs but have no idea what herb was for what. So
I ordered Neosporin, Vitamins, Sunscreen and Pepto bismol over the
internet and had it shipped to Aunt Joan. Then Tim needed a new pair of
pants and bike jersey, then we decided to buy folding tires and bike
chains. We did not think these things weighted that much, by themselves
at least. Oh and our camera was broke too. First we looked around in Beijing for a new camera and could
not find what we wanted at the price we wanted. So we ordered a new
camera over the internet and shipped it to Aunt Joan too. We met Aunt Joan the night she
arrived and were shocked when we picked up our bag and it weight over 15
lbs. Wow, she hauled a lot over here for us. Luckily they did not
charge more for the extra weight. Now our bikes will get new chains and
we have sunscreen too. We love our new Sony HC90 too. |
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On one of days in Beijing we decided to go and hike the
Great Wall from Jinshanling to Simatai. We paid 80 Y ($10) each
for transportation and 65 Y ($8) for entrance to the Great Wall and
bridge crossing. It took us a whopping 5 hours to get out there
and 3 to get back. The tour group was a bit unorganized to say the
least. However, the hike was beautiful and well worth the effort.
We finally left the smog of Beijing behind and could see blue sky.
The hike took the 4 hours allotted, there was no time to sit and gaze at
this wonderful piece of history, a little more time would have been
nice. Also, as soon as we went to the wall we were followed by
locals trying to act as guides or sell us something. We kept
telling them we did not want a guide and they did not leave us alone
until we told them we did not have any money. I suppose some
people may want a guide but I feel that talking about this up front is
the way to go not demand money once the hike is over. I would
recommend bringing plenty of water, the locals only sell small half
liter bottles and we Tim and I drank two liters each and still had to
buy water. We met Jessie and Angel from the US on the hike. |
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Beijing is a shopping Mecca, more that I thought would
be. Women's clothes and shoes in every style imaginable. We
did not buy our camera here but could have for about 30 - 40% more.
However, we did buy camera accessories like a 512 memory stick for 400 Y
($50) much cheaper than the US. We also bought a UV and polarizer
filter and wide angle lens. |
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We finally made it to the Forbidden City, we waited
until we had our camera. It was an extremely busy tour day, summer
vacation had just started and the tour groups were in full swing.
We have included a picture of the Palace of Harmony in our photo
journal, one is a photo that Lloyd took while the place was completely
empty (how he got this shot is beyond me) and another when we were there
and the place was completely full. What a difference. The Palace
Museum also know as the Forbidden City is under a huge renovation
project so a lot of the buildings were off limits. I hope to come
back here for the 2008 Olympics and visit again. I love the
history surrounding these places, it is a large part of Chinese history.
Many emperors lived here with the wives and concubines, what the
concubines did with their time, I haven't a clue. I can only guess
that there was a lot of gossiping going on. The cost of the city
was a bit of a disappointment because on top of the entrance fee of 60 Y
($7.50) there were extra fees to see the water clock, the dragon wall,
the hall of jewelry and a few other places. We bought a ticket for
15 Y ( 1.88) thinking it was the ticket to the forbidden city and it
turned out to be the ticket to the Tiananmen gate. We went up on
the gate only to be shuffled off because some dignitary was visiting
Beijing and they were clearing out the area. Tiananmen square was
void of people and the military was showing off their artillery pulled
behind SUVs. We would later find out the dignitary was our Secretary of
State Condelessa Rice. This event was not published in the local news. |
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By far my favorite place that we visited was the Summer
Palace. This was the place where I could get a feel for what it
was like to be an Emperor or Empress. Some of the buildings had the
furniture used by the Emperor still in them. This was not the case
at the Forbidden City. The famous Empress Cixi of the Qing dynasty
spent most of her time here. She picked the last emperor Puyi.
I would recommend a full day for the Summer Palace, there are gardens to
explore, dragon boats to ride, and temples to view. |
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INDEX #3:
SE Asia / China
11-22-04 to 9-15-06
December 16- January 16, 2004
Cambodia and Angkor Wat
Poipet to Tien Bien, Cambodia |
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Best Place to see Pictures
Cambodia Thumbnail Pictures
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(January 16 - February 17 , 2005)
Vietnam #1.
Tinh Bien to Cau Ganh, Vietnam |
Tim's Emailed Newsletters
(Join List)
Best Place to see Pictures
South Vietnam Thumbnails
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May 22 - June 27, 2005
Guizhou and Hunan,
China
Congjiang to
Zhangjiajie National Park China |
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Best Place to see Pictures
Pictures of Guizhou, China.
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(July 16 - Sept. 3, 2005)
Inner Mongolia and Shanxi, China.
Beijing to Xian, Shaanxi, China |
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Best Place to see Pictures
Thumbnail pictures from Inner
Mongolia, China.
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Full size Picture
Pages
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Beijing to Jining, Inner Mongolia.
-
Grasslands of Jining, to Wuchuan (near) Hohhot
- Hohhot
to Bautou, Inner Mongolia, China
- Wudang
Lamasary
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Bautou to Yulin, Shanxi, China with Photos from Genghis Khan's Mausoleum.
- Yulin to
Yanan, Shaanxi, China
-
Chairman Mao's Headquarters and Residence in Yanan, China.
- Yanan to
Xian, Shaanxi, China.
-
Terracotta Warriors #1
-
Terracotta Warriors #2. |
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(Sept. 4 - Oct. 29, 2005)
Sichuan, China
Chengdu, to Zongdian, China
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Best Place to see Pictures
Sichuan Thumbnail Photos
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Full size Picture
Pages
- Giant Panda
Breeding Center #1
- Red Panda
in Chengdu, Sichuan, China #2
-
Chengdu to Kangding.
- Kangding,
Sichuan, located in Southwestern China.
-
Mugecuo Lake near Kangding, Sichuan, China.
- Kangding
to Xinduqiao
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Xinduqiao to Tibetan Home Stay.
- Tibetan
Home Stay to 4718 meter (15,475 feet)
- to
Litang, Sichuan, China.
-
Litang Lamasary Tibetan Buddhist Monk Monastery
- Litang
to Sumdo, Tibet
- Sumdo to
Xiangcheng
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Xiangcheng to Derong, Tibet.
- Derong,
Sichuan Province to Tibetan Shangri-La, (Zongdian) |
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(Oct. 30 - Dec. 24, 2005)
Yunnan, China
Zongdian to Mohan, China
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Best Place to see Pictures
Yunnan thumbnail photos
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(July - Sept. 15, 2006)
Malaysia #3 and Singapore.
Taiping, Malaysia to
Singapore |
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Best Place to see Pictures
Malaysia #3 and Singapore
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Thailand
Laos
