.Tour of Beijing City - Tiananmen Square - Forbidden City

Gardens near the entrance
see all photos »

Sorry for the late update, things have not all gone to plan and its been a bit tough to get reliable internet access at time that were convienient for us.

After our Great wall tour and not feeling up to the shopping on this tour, we decided to go it alone. And it worked out great! We were tired nd still a little sore from our bike ride so it was nice to take the walk on our own.

We caught a cab into the city and started our walk from there, after about another 3klm or so of crazy Beijing traffic we found the entry to Tiananmen Square and the beautiful gardens around it.

More gardens
see all photos »

It was a litte crazy, there were way more tourists than i expected and beggers, thieves and streets sellers were harassing us at every turn. Tiananmen square was a bit of an anti-climax from what we saw, other than the history of the place, there was not much to been seen that we havent already seen in pictures or TV, it was more exciting just to be there and see these sights.

After heading inside the first gate at Tiananman square and into the gates of the Forbidden city we really started to appreciate how powerful Chinese emporers of the past must have been, very ruthless and powerful men.

This is quite a sight, we've all seen it on TV, but in real life, its quite majestic
see all photos »

The Forbidden City was enormous, 900 buildings in total and a large number of them filled with cultural relics of some description to be viewed, far too much for the few hours we were going to spend there.

But it was a lovely day and we leanrt many new things about the Chinese culture etc. For example, if your white and need a taxi, you're going to be ripped off by 90% of cab drivers, thats if they dont swish you away like a fly that is annoying them. Lisa has saved us a number of times for being totally ripped off, im still not quick enough to pick up on whats going on most of the time. haha

Inside the Forbidden City
see all photos »

Although Beijing didnt go to plan and we are privelidged enough to see some incredible things that most people will only ever get to see on TV, we were definitly looking forward to getting out of Beijing and into Xian early in the morning. Big cities just dont seem to agree with us or our personalities, hahaha. Too soft maybe?...