Summer in Beijing - Part 2

Day 2 (Monday, July 30th). We got up relatively early and walked to the Forbidden City which is directly north of Tiananmen. Once again, we were sweating well before getting to our destination. The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace for the Ming and Qing Dynasties. It’s called Forbidden because it was off limits to commoners for 500 years (it was built in the early 1400’s). To say this place is big is a vast understatement. It’s over 700,000 square metres, has 800 buildings and more than 9000 rooms! We could have easily spent the whole day there, but it was just packed with tourists so after a couple hours we decided to explore some less busy areas.

Day 3 (Tuesday, July 31st). Today we hit up the Summer Palace which is where the emperors and their entourages would come to escape the heat from the Forbidden City. This place was huge and really impressive. It’s basically a bunch of palaces built atop Longevity Hill all leading down to Kunming Lake. This was our favourite place in Beijing so far.

Day 4 (Wednesday, August 1st). Today was our Great Wall day. We got up early and headed out on a trip run by our hostel to the Mutianyu section of the wall. It was pretty much everything I had expected and a lot more. The Great Wall is one of the only places in the world that I’ve always wanted to see, and it didn’t disappoint. Whatever I say will not do it justice.

Inside a watchtower;