May 6 Our last day in Beijing

Remains of the old western part of the city wall

After a couple of long days of walking and climbing stairs, today our third and last day in Beijing, we were simply too pooped to do the longish trip to the Summer Palace that we had planned, but took a couple of shortish walks locally.

On the corner of 'our road' we found an excavation site  It exposed the ruins of the part of the old city wall and one of its gates from the Ming dynasty. Interesting what you stumble across when you go out on foot!  We strolled along leafy paths between streets looking at birds and plants before plunging into the Hutong maze not so far from our hotel. Although it was not more than 1 Km from the hotel we could have been in another city entirely. Tiny alleyways gave access to tiny houses and courts. Some of the old buildings have been replaced with multistorey apartments, but the area was still dense with older dwellings crushed side-by-side. We felt lost in a labyrinth with no sense of direction or indeed if we would ever get out. But Lindsay bravely followed me (I was using MapsMe which of course didn’t have the laneways mapped but did give us general direction) as we twisted and turned waiting all the while for a gang of thugs to leap out from around the next corner. I had to keep checking that Lindsay was behind me - he was distracted by any bird that flew passed. We made it out - and miraculously almost opposite our hotel.  What an amazing maze!!

This might look tangled but wait until you see Xi'an!

This is the  entrance to the International Youth Hostel - I thought it was a temple!

The laneways and houses are a hive of activity. This man was repairing a bike.

Some hutongs backed onto the moat surrounding the Forbidden City. Aircon but no toilets!

Once back on ‘home’ turf, we strolled the street with families and visitors alike - it was a Sunday so the normal hustle and bustle was quieter. I took pix of the cute little ‘tuktuks’ buzzing up and down the streets. They were usually enclosed motor scooters and serve many purposes from people to goods. Fabulous idea for busy narrow streets. 

We came across this bike rickshaw as it was disappearing around a corner.

Let someone else do the work and travel in style! Great way to travel.

A sunset walk took us past the National Children’s Theatre to an upmarket retail street. Almost wall-to -all international brand names. We were looking for food predominantly so we headed back to the spot we knew and ate ourselves sick - we left with a ‘doggy bag’ for our 6-hour train trip to Xi’an the next day.

The National Children's Theatre

Posteres from some of the Childrens' Theatre productions decorate the walls

Always the streets are busy with people, bikes, scooters, cars and it has given me pause for thought to realise that Beijing is home to about the same number of people as populate the whole of Australia!
Tomorrow Xi’an  ......