So yesterday I departed the train at Badaling at 07:30, which is in the North of China. What! What! I had ‘googled’ Badaling and found out that I could do a day bus tour which would mean that I could go to the Great Wall of China, visit ‘Panda Garden’ and the ‘Summer Palace”. All for a bargain price of £71.32. Here is a copy of my iternary for the day.
8:00 Pickup from Badaling train station
8:40 Olympic Stadium (drive by)
9:20 Arrive at Badaling section of the Great Wall
9:30-10:50 Tour of the Great Wall
11:30-13:00 Lunch and Shopping
14:00-15:20 Tour of Summer Palace
16:10-17:00 Visit Zoo to see Pandas
18:00 Tour concludes at Badaling train station
8:40 Olympic Stadium (drive by)
9:20 Arrive at Badaling section of the Great Wall
9:30-10:50 Tour of the Great Wall
11:30-13:00 Lunch and Shopping
14:00-15:20 Tour of Summer Palace
16:10-17:00 Visit Zoo to see Pandas
18:00 Tour concludes at Badaling train station
So there I was on a bus tour. The modes of transport I am experiencing is wonderful I must say. First we drove past the Olympic Stadium which apparently was built for the 2008 Olympic and Paralympic games. It was a very unusual shape as it looks like a giant bird’s nest.
We then journeyed on to the ‘Great Wall of China”. As I exited the bus the sight I saw was truly remarkable. I felt overwhelmed by the thousands of stairsteps that greeted me upon setting foot in Badaling. My initial goal of getting as far as I could until I had to return to the bus but the wall seemed to stretch for infinity. I would have to climb for at least a kilometre just to get to the first beacon – and that was just the lower part of the mountain. No wonder they can see the wall from space because until you see it face-to-face then you do not realise its vastness.
In the afternoon the bus tour took us first to the Summer Palace. Another truly wonderful sight my dear friends. Now the Summer Palace is a number of lakes, gardens and palaces in Bejing. But we stopped by Longevity Hill and the Kunming Lake a popular area. It is so beautiful here that it is very hard to describe what I saw.
So my dear friends my next stop on the bus tour was very exciting! I got to see pandas up close :o) Oh! how wonderful it was. Have a look at my little video.
So after such as exciting day I returned to the train station and boarded the 19:00 train to Shanghai. I arrived in Shanghai very early at 05:32 this morning. Despite being so early Shanghai was very busy. Now as I needed to get to Yokohama quickly then I immediately booked a flight to Japan. Now I found out that I could get the 12:20 flight and I would arrive in Yokohama at 14:45 so I went straight to the airport, as I would unfortunately not have time for any sightseeing. What! What! So I arrived here this afternoon and intend to stay a couple of days before journeying on to San Francisco.
Toodle pip my dear friends!
Toodle pip my dear friends!