China Expeditions

In Beijing for the 2008 Olympic Games?
What are your plans after the games?
You can’t visit China without an experience of the Great Wall.
 
Join the Great Wall Explorer
4 days Great Wall and highlights of Beijing
Post-Olympics special experience

Let China Expeditions host you for two nights in silver-service camping at an exclusive location beneath the Great Wall at Mt Simatai, and then on return to Beijing wander through some of the highlights of the capital over two days, concluding with superb dining in one of the city’s finest roast-duck restaurants and a variety show, including Beijing opera, at a studio theatre on the final evening.

This innovative tour delivered by the pioneers of the Great Wall Trek is a rare opportunity to visit on day walks one of the finest examples of Ming Dynasty Great Wall, camp in comfort near a hamlet and be pampered by your western and Chinese hosts.

There is fine dining in camp and accommodation is in comfortable two-person dome tents with lined sleeping-bags.

The day walks are easy for the inexperienced and have been tailored more as a countryside-excursion.

You do not need experience as a “trekker”.

There is time to pause and reflect, to photograph the grand landscape and be intrigued by the history of the wall and imperial China as narrated by your experienced guides from China Expeditions.

On return to Beijing we visit Tiananmen Square, the geographic heart of the city and enshrined in symbolism of modern China, make a quick tour of the Great Hall of the People (the plenary hall seats 10 000) and then enter the enormous Imperial Palace, known as the Forbidden City.

A city within a city from where both Ming and Qing dynasty emperors ruled the Middle Kingdom until 1911, this colossal edifice surpasses all expectations.

There are vast courts and pavilions, a massive marble carving transported to the palace on an iced road, a clock museum, concubines’ quarters and nearby the court where the last emperor declared his abdication.

He was later evicted, without ceremony, while peeling apples with his wife.

Before we exit there is a ramble through an astonishing garden, of such longevity that the many aged conifers have been declared cultural artifacts.

North of the Imperial Palace, and after lunch, we take a rickshaw ride through the alleyways of a district representative of old Beijing.

Here lived some of the former leaders and members of the imperial establishment and later those who helped found the People’s Republic.

We narrate this history and how this area has survived the onrush of development.

Two other outstanding sites are visited: The Temple of Heaven, of the Ming Dynasty, was visited by the emperor each spring to provide sacrificial offerings to the gods, to bring forth good fortune in the ensuing season.

This site has an echo wall, superb pavilions and extensive gardens.

Near the temple’s exit is the renowned Hong Qiao market, a veritable Alladin’s cave.

We make a quick excursion to secure a bargain or two.

In the northwest of the city is the Summer Palace, a vast lakeside assembly of palace-style buildings in an extensive garden.

This was the summer home for the Qing emperors and they were conveyed by boat from the Forbidden City on canal to this salubrious retreat.

We take an afternoon stroll here, return to our hotel and freshen up for dining at one of the best roast duck restaurants in Beijing.

Afterwards, there is more than delight at an evening studio theatre tea-house: its foyer is adorned with photographs of world leaders who have graced the theatre to enjoy mini Beijing opera, acrobatics, magic, classical music, story-telling, mime and the unexpected.

A delightful finale to four packed days.

ITINERARY

• Day 1: By bus to Simatai and our campsite. An afternoon walk on the Great Wall. A welcoming dinner, with fine wines of China, in our large dining tents.
• Day 2: A smorgasbord breakfast and then a morning walk on the Great Wall, lunch, a visit to the historic town of Gubeikou and the Great Wall, and return to Beijing in the afternoon.
• Day 3: To Tiananmen Square, the Great Hall of the People, the Imperial Palace (Forbidden City), and a rickshaw ride through the alleyways of north Beijing, a visit to the Bell Tower and an opportunity for shopping. Dinner is at the legendary, colourful Old Beijing Restaurant, an eatery reminiscent of the restaurants of earlier Beijing.
• Day 4: A relaxed stroll through the Temple of Heaven, some shopping at the Hong Qiao Market, then to the Summer Palace. Dinner is at a roast-duck restaurant, followed by a variety show, an evening at a studio theatre.