My Beijing Trip ... Day 5

In just a blink of the eye it was already the last day of our Beijing trip. Somehow the booking of the flights were a little messed up because of midnight flights and I only had 5 days there instead of the 6 I envisioned....

We woke up early and checked out of the hotel, just leaving our luggages in storage as to get back to the airport we had to use the same Subway line to Dongzhimen nearby. With that, we headed out and walk towards the Bell Tower and Drum Tower passing by lots of food shops we did not notice before since we did not pass that road...

There was even a Halal Hotpot BBQ place there.... sighh... too bad our time is so short...

Anyway we got to walk pass the Bell Tower and the Drum Tower

From there we walked all the way towards Beihai Park, passing another lovely lake , the Houhai Lake nearby.. There were many people there who were exercising or fishing....

Entrance to the Beihai Park was cheap.. at just RMB10... we got in there and strolled around taking pictures of the lovely park and staring away in the distance towards the island where the white pagoda and some royal residences were... 

There were lots of old elderly folks exercising in various ways from Tai Chi to stretching to mock sword fights and so on... it was admirable to see them keeping fit during their free time...

Check out the cute yellow duck paddle boats....

The pavilions and palaces were just as beautiful... but we were not ready to walk the whole park... because of time constraint.... So when it was about  8.20am, we left the park and walked towards our next destination... which was the Prince Gong's Mansion....

Prince Gong Mansion is supposedly one of the best kept courtyard mansions in Beijing and so it was... It costed us RMB40 for entrance, but well worth the visit... it was beautiful... and the garden was breathtaking...

Be sure to read and see more pictures of the Mansion in upcoming posts.... I really love this place a lot!!!

There is also a photo booth stop where you can rent the costumes for about RMB25 and take your own pictures.... or take a 'professional' picture for RMB40... And the vain and 'perasan' me, could not resist to play pretend to be an Empress again.... hahaha

Then we headed to our final must visit place which had been first on our agenda but because of the timing, closed, so we visit it again today..... the Forbidden City!!! And oh my God... the crowd was crazy...it was so packed with visitors from all over ....This must be the most busiest place of  interest in Beijing I visited....

The entrance was RMB60 per person..... hahahah

And as I mentioned, the Forbidden City is so packed with visitors from all over the world and China and at the interesting sights like the throne room and all , there was a lot of pushing and shoving just to catch a glimpse as well as take your pictures... Definitely NOT a place to bring small kids....or if you bring them, you shouldn't  try to look at the throne room.....hahahha....

The first palace or hall was beautiful.. as it has been restored but subsequent palaces and halls at the back were more faded and kinda dusty and old looking, as to be expected.... 

I however, really adore the Imperial Garden... it however was NOT as BIG as I imagined... yeah.. yeah... the Chinese Dramas lied...the imperial gardens are not so big... unless they mean the ones at Beihai /Winter Palace or Summer Palace....and  if the floor or ground in which we walked on were like this originally I really have a hard time imagining how the Concubines and Handmaidens and all manage their balance and kept their poise walking there especially on elevated shoes...... LOL....

After the Forbidden City, my daughter and I got conned into a Hutong Tour trishaw ride. The guy said it was just RMB80 and so we asked if it was RMB80 for both of us and RMB40 for each one, and he nodded... We then thought it was a great idea and when else since our legs were pretty tired from all the walking...he then made us walk a distance from the exit of the Forbidden Palace before taking us around two or three hutongs with nothing too remarkable or interesting then dropping us off before demanding RMB160 from us...Sighhh.... so there... be careful and do not agree on these no brainer hutong rides....

We then headed back to the hotel and decided to visit the Drum Tower and Bell Tower which costed RMB30 for visits to both towers per person, and which really half killed me.... At both towers we had to climb a whooping 75 steep stairs up the tower and I was panting and gasping like a dying fish by the time I got to the top....

After that, we walked back to our hotel and collected the luggages and headed to Dongzhimen and take the Airport Express to the Airport...  and gasp... since our flight was at 1.30am.... we could not even get to check in our luggages until it was 10.30pm.... huhuhu....

But well... that was the end of our trip to Beijing... This is just a summarization and I will be going into more depth about the places I visited soon in upcoming blog posts... so stay tuned.....

Pictures here are all taken on my new Nikon Coolpix S33 camera....