🇨🇳 Mini-Sabbatical Part 2: Beijing to Chengdu

This is part of the mini-sabbatical series. Read more here.

Back in Beijing #

Gubei was awesome, but the unrelenting march of time moves on, and so we find ourselves on the way back to Beijing.

Along we way we stopped for a quick break to relieve ourselves at a rest stop. Most countries have these places, and they all seem to stand out for different reasons.

For the French, it’s the nice public toilets and picnic benches.

For the British, it’s the fact that Welcome Break somehow have a monopoly.

For the Americans, it’s the strange business-park layout that forces you to drive between buildings.

For the Chinese, it’s the urinals that measure your glucose levels.

Bit surreal, but we continued regardless (I didn’t pay to have it done).

Olympic Park #

We still had a couple of hours of sunlight to kill on the way back to the flat, so we thought it would be a good chance to see the buildings that put Beijing on the map for me. The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Park!

The Beijing Olympic park is not too dissimilar from Olympic parks from other cities to be honest. There is the centrepiece stadium, now used by local sports teams or for concerts. There is of course a huge shopping mall (in this case, under the whole complex) and a few museums to take advantage of the mass transit systems that had to be built.

A few architectural standouts won’t go amiss either, such as the Beijing Olympic Tower (that strangely was only build 6 years after the games). Whilst we didn’t go up it, the views would I’m sure have been incredible.

The last place we visited here was the Olympic Forest Park. For a city so vast and so heavily developed, it is always welcome to escape into nature a bit, and this park absolutely scratches that itch for so many of Beijing’s residents. Even offering bike + kayak rental for a small fee, it’s a quite literal breath of fresh air.

Even though it’s pretty far out (right on the edge of the city, a couple hours to get to for us!), it was absolutely rammed. I could liken it maybe to Hyde Park in peak summer, but with almost zero tourists (as Beijing didn’t really have many outside visitors when I arrived).

The running track that goes through the park was quite comical, with people practically queuing to get past one another, but I digress - clearly it has a strong demand and we must be grateful for it’s existence.

We enjoyed sunset with a short hike, then slowly made our way back to the flat.

Tian Tan Park #

More parks!

In the morning, we grabbed ourselves a Chinese pancake and McDonalds coffee (don’t judge me) from near Feiyang’s flat, and set out to tick some more items off the Tripadvisor list.

Tian Tan (also called the Temple of Heaven) is one of the largest parks in Beijing, or at least the largest one located centrally. Within it, you’ll fine a well landscaped park, complete with many areas for the traditional “Auntie Dance Class”.

This was probably my favourite thing that I saw throughout Asia that I really wish the West had more of. If you are retired, you need to keep fit somehow, so why not join a group and dance to some wildly out of genre tiktok pop songs in a group? I loved it!

There were some Uncles joining in, but typically they would join the Uncle Class, who would be trying out some other activities such as Tai Chi.

We spotted one absolute legend of an Uncle travelling around on his new toy, a motorised suitcase.

Not quite sure what he was trying to do here, as the suitcase was walking pace, and the cobblestone actually forced him to fall over a couple times, but it was funny to see so I grant him that.

In the center of the Temple of Heaven is the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, and the highest concentration of school field trips.

I am ashamed to admit that I learnt almost nothing from the countless temples we visited. Big fan of the architecture, but I just can’t recall anything in particular that stood out about this temple.

Lama Temple #

In an attempt to experience more, on recommendation from Feiyang’s Mum, we went to visit the Lama temple.

This was the first Buddhist temple I had ever visited, and what first struck me as intriguing were the large communal Censers.

The idea is that you pick up 3 sticks of incense (specifically 3, to transcend towards equilibrium, stability and infinity). Upon lighting your incense, you stand in front of the Censer, say your prayer and place them inside to burn with the rest.

Very peaceful, I really enjoyed the atmosphere. I was also perhaps starting to get a bit lightheaded from all of the smoke.

Summer Palace #

Summer Palace is a must visit if you are in Beijing for more than a week.

Not to be confused with the “Old Summer Palace” (just down the road, but destroyed by the French+British in the mid-1800’s), it is a wonderful example of traditional architecture blending in with nature. Of course, all places this beautiful are mired in some form of controversy. For the Summer Palace, a significant proportion of funds that were supposed to be used to upgrade the Chinese Navy were instead rerouted to expanding the Summer Palace in celebration of the Empress’s 60th birthday.

Besides it’s history, nowadays it is simply a tourist attraction that can be booked through WeChat, with great views over the surrounding area, and some great walking routes around the expansive and well maintained gardens.

We were visiting in late October, so the nights were beginning to draw in a bit earlier, but sunset gave this place a mystical feeling, and as we walked back to the car, past street artists along the promenade of the lake, we took some time to slow down and watch the sun set.

Museums #

Entering our second week in Beijing, we were struggling to find things to do.

The issue with accidentally aligning our trip with the Belt and Road conference, was that whilst the weather was amazing the previous week, all major attractions near Tiananmen Square were shut. Now that the diplomats have left, a huge wave of bookings via WeChat meant that the Forbidden City along with most other attractions had sold out. Top Tip: Book tickets on WeChat well in advance. Supposedly 85k tickets are available for the forbidden city every day, and they sell out in minutes.

Also weirdly enough, as soon as the diplomats left, the pollution came back.

Better luck next time, I guess?

I still have a few more things to see in Beijing before I can consider it “ticked off”.

The National Museum of China is one of the largest museums in the world (I actually can’t tell whether or not it is the largest, it didn’t feel as big as the Louvre to me).

We saw one chunk of it, with the impressive but quite politicised The Road to Rejuvenation exhibit covering the highs and lows of the Chinese people over the last 200 years. Since the start of the CCP it has apparently been all highs.

Of course, I’m not blind to propaganda from all sides, and naturally you wouldn’t expect a museum funded by a government, showcasing all of the recent failures of that government.

As we cycle back through Tiananmen Square to head back to the flat, I admire the famous smooth face on the wall, and wonder what he’s seen over the years perched up there.

Adventures in Xi’an #

I knew absolutely nothing about Xi’an (much as I did with the rest of China), but there are 2 things I will remember about Xi’an. The Wall, and the Statues.

Terracotta Army #

As we pull up to the compound early in the morning, we are faced by a veritable sea of Aunties. No need to worry though, having researched beforehand the fastest route to Pit 1, and armed with our younger legs we pace our way to the front, being some of the first to enter the halls that morning.

As the morning light streamed across the hall, it was a bit corny to say that it was a special sight, but it truly was.

You can read up about the army from many other sources if you want to learn more, so I won’t bore you too much. However something you might not have realised (I didn’t) is that each soldier was once beautifully and vibrantly painted, and this paint was in fact still present when the soldiers were first unearthed in the 70’s.

50 years of public display and tourism subsequently caused this paint to fade and flake away, cautionary tale of how tourism and the commercialisation of history can erode history itself. Leaving the museum, we walk past a McDonalds, Starbucks and a cinema, the irony entirely lost on us.

The Wall #

An almost perfect rectangle with a 14km circumference.

We rented a couple of bikes and marvelled in amazement at what an architectural achievement it must have been to build this defence system so well, so long ago (though only around 500 years in all fairness).

At night, there was some kind of theatrical performance inside the main building by the south gate, and the entire perimeter is lit up by LEDs, truly one of the best cities to visit whilst in China.

A park, some shops, and a Buddhist temple #

Outside of the wall are the usual suspects of cool places to visit in a chinese city: A park, some shops, and a Buddhist temple.

I can’t remember much about the park, besides the fact that it was quite expensive to enter, pretty empty, and had a wonderful light/fountain show in the main lake.

As for the shops, there is this ridiculously over the top main street, with interactive artwork, public performances and at least a dozen electric car brand showrooms flanking either side of it.

On the electric car topic, China is so full of such high quality electric cars that it boggles the western mind.

We saw everything from small electic Jeep knockoffs for £8k (my favourite), to £25k Tesla-esque cars, all the way up to the wackiest £16k car for babies. I don’t really know how to explain it, but they have built a car that is custom designed to fit 2 parents and a baby. The front seats turn around to view the kid, there is a camera in the back trained on the kid with a live view up front, and special baby bottle warmers under the arm rests. I don’t necessarily think that it would be the best purchase decision, but they seemed to have some kind of leasing program where you graduate into a proper car after a few years, so I guess it works fine for whatever audience they are targeting…

The temple we visited was pretty memorable, but only for childish reasons (I never seem to learn too much from my travels).

In the centre sat the Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, an impressive tower that bears no resemblance to a goose.

In one of the surrounding buildings, an intricate wooden carving of The Journey to the West.

Feiyang tried her best to explain it to me, but I couldn’t quite get over how some dude, a pig, a monkey and a horse could really get along with each other.

Disappointment in Chengdu #

Ever since first trying “proper” chinese food (according to Feiyang), I had fallen in love with the Sichuan pepper.

As a direct result of this and the allure of seeing pandas where pandas are from, I made sure to extend our route all the way West to Chengdu, despite the considerable length of time we would be stuck on trains.

Upon arriving in Chengdu however, I was unfortunately hit like a train by what I think was probably the O.G. of COVID-19 strains.

This meant we had to sadly cancel our Panda visit, and I spent all day in bed at the hotel whilst Feiyang went cafe hopping, revising for her exams and reading her books.

I did manage to crawl out of the hotel for just long enough to get a proper Sichuan hotpot at a Jay Chou themed restaurant. Boy was it spicy!