(2019-12-11) Beijing | Devon Winrick's Blog

(2019-12-10) Beijing

(2019-12-12) Beijing to Zhuozhou (涿州), and then to Baoding

December 11th Beijing

The plan for the 11th was to tour the Summer Palace. Like many great adventures, it starts with McDonalds.

I didn't take a picture of our order, however here you can see the screen you use.

The whole ordering process is done from this screen.

This palace was ordered to be built by the emperor to replicate South China temples as he liked them but did not want to frequently travel to South China.

As we were visiting in the winter, it was very empty. However I'm pretty grateful that we went during this time as it was very peaceful.

A very peaceful frozen river.

A morning selfie.

You can see in my pocket on the left the digital guide they gave us - just like the Palace.

After you cross the first bridge you can go down to the lower level and walk around. There are no railings.

If you slip it's going to be very cold.

It may not appear as such to you, however this is very much a tourist area. Most of the buildings are functional, and some of them even had functional tourist shops open while we were there.

While most active in the summer, the tourist shops remain open in the Winter.

A pretty bridge, and the view after crossing it.

From here we had to do some climbing.

Here's a picture of our progress after a while.

Up a little higher...

Also, here's a video of this area.

Almost to the top you reach this building. Note the detail on all the little statues.

The whole building is covered with these.

Here's a video of the back side of the building.

Almost to the top.

We didn't have to go through this door, however we passed it on the way up.

Over the Crest

The reason we had done all the hiking up over this mountain was to get to the large lake on the other side.

Here we can start to see our reward for climbing - a view of the lake.

Here you can get a first glimpse of the island in the center of the lake - we'll be making our way over there.

We passed this building on the way down to the lake. I think at the time I found the shapes of the glass interesting.

It's probably just square panes of glass.

At the lake!

Finally, we arrive.

There are speakers all around the lake playing music.

Around one side of the lake is a long walkway that is decorated in fine detail.

Selfy along the walkway.

Before we start our walk around the lake, we get to look at this stone boat.

No, it does not actually float.

Making our way around the lake, at this point we are almost half way and you can see this arch.

I'm not sure what it is for or means.

Here's a video of that area, complete with the same music as before. :)

Here's a guy writing Chinese with a brush and water on the sidewalk.

Here's a video of that area, complete with the same music as before. :)

From that area we cross a bridge to the island in the center of the lake. Here's the view from the other side.

A popular sunset view.

Here's the sun out over the water.

People were packed close like sardines to get a shot from this angle once the sun began to set.

Video of the sunset under the bridge.

We took a quick stroll around the island, and I grabbed this shot.

On the way back we accidentally stumbled into some kind of gift shop. A guy was doing magic tricks, and seemed pretty upset that we didn't want to buy things off of him after his performance.

So, that's the Summer Palace in Beijing. Our next goal was food. To get to food we needed to get to the subway station. The subway was a couple kilometers away.

We decided against a taxi and decided to walk, which we immediately regretted and waved down this gentleman in his three-wheeled taxi.

I bet a lot of tourists don't ride in these, but we did.

One think that's easy to miss from my footage is how old this guy is. If you look closely in the video you can see the old man's crutches.

Video from the inside.

The vehicle is essentially a motorcycle with an extra wheel and a shell around you. Being close to traffic did make be a bit nervous. Nevertheless, we made it to the subway station safely at the cost of something like $2.

A quick, blurry picture of the subway station wall shows one interesting fact about Beijing - begging is illegal.

Begging is illegal.

We made our way back to the mall and found a place selling Baos that we saw the night before.

The "7" here is about a dollar.

Here's some of the buns we managed to snatch up.

They are good as they look.

Craving meat, we settled at a restaurant. I ordered what looked like a sweet cold drink on the menu. When it arrived - the ice was placed around the cup. Nice touch.

I said meat, so I can't just not show that.