Beijing for May Day: Trains, Planes, and Automobiles

Damn Hangzhou traffic. Well really I should say damn Didi drivers! Didi is the Chinese version of Uber. Katherine, one of the Chinese counselors, ordered a ride with Didi to take Joanna and me to the train station Friday afternoon at 1:30. Our train wasn’t scheduled to depart until 3:30, so I assumed we had plenty of time.

The key word in that last sentence is assumed. By the time the driver made it to the school and we were on our way it was after 1:45. Then he took the one road we should have avoided, the road that’s plagued by construction and always a parking lot. I kept thinking he’d realize the mistake and take an alternate route ASAP. There I go with my assumptions again. He was following the GPS directions, and my guess is he was a part-time or new driver who didn’t know the local area.

Many Didi divers don't actually know the city well and
just use their smartphones to get around

Progress was painfully slow, and as 3:00 came and went we were still miles from the train station. It didn’t take long for it to dawn on us that we would miss our train to Beijing. Missing the train to Suzhou would have been an insignificant speed-bump compared to Beijing. The ticket cost us nearly $100, and worse, there weren’t any more seats available to the capital that evening.

The only other option was a flight; a one-way ticket scheduled to leave that evening was $200. I was no doubt disappointed that we missed the train, but still keen on a trip to Beijing, so Joanna and I agreed to go ahead with a flight, which we (and by we I mean she) booked over the phone in the taxi. When the tickets were good to go we told the driver to head to the airport instead. It’s further than the train station, but still in the same general direction from our house. By the time we arrived at Hangzhou International Airport we had been stuck in the cab for over 3 hours!

This is a map of the Hangzhou area; our school is northwest of downtown
(Hangzhou City), close to Gongshu, basically the opposite side of
the city from the airport. Still, at 33 kilometers (just over 20 miles),
a 3+ hour taxi ride is insane!

True to form our flight was delayed. Side note: you’re ever flying out of Hangzhou, expect the unexpected. Fortunately once we got off the ground the flight itself was unexciting. Because of the delay, we made it to the airport metro in Beijing 5 minutes after the last train had departed! At the taxi stand hundreds of people snaked around medal railings and barriers. I thought we’d be waiting for hours, but taxis came by the dozens and it only took 20 minutes (yes, in China, waiting 20 minutes can be described as “only”). It was nearly midnight when we hit the road, and the highway into town was nearly empty, a rarity for Beijing. Despite its location down a narrow alleyway (called a “hutong”) we managed to find the guesthouse without much of a fuss and checked in by 12:30.

Joanna and I were up bright and early at 6:30 for our trip to the Great Wall. Since it was a holiday – we had a three day weekend for Labor Day—we anticipated big crowds and wanted to beat the mid-day rush. At the station the line for our city bus wrapped around the corner, packed with people in hiking gear and backpacks. As with the airport, we quickly progressed through the line and were off by 8 am.

Seeing as it was a holiday weekend, I was worried about crowds at
the wall, so we skipped Badaling, the closest and most popular section.

When I say we were off, that conjures up an image of a road trip, or at least of a bus actually moving. It wasn’t long before we were sitting bumper to bumper in Beijing traffic. I was concerned; “Are all the damn people going to the wall?” What I later concluded was that most of the cars were actually leaving the city for the holiday weekend, because once we actually got to the wall the crowds were tame.

I don’t want to breeze over the drive that quickly; it took us over 3 hours on the bus to reach the local town to transfer to a minivan taxi. Once we actually reached the wall it was noon! I was expecting hordes of tourists, but the sea of bodies turned out to be a manageable crowd. We didn’t have the wall to ourselves, but it was far better than expected. Granted we skipped out on the nearest and most popular section of the wall, but still, the relative calm was a pleasant surprise.

We took a chair lift to the wall itself and hiked along for an hour before turning back to catch the slide down. I did say slide—we bought a ticket that included a ride on a wheeled toboggan down the mountain. It was less than a kilometer downhill, and we never reached close to I’m-going-to-die speeds, but it still was an exciting way to end our tour of the wall.

Riding up to the wall.

I was impressed with how few people were at Mutianyu, the section of the wall we visited

Sliding back down!

The bus ride back took half the time as leaving Beijing, but when we got back to our neighborhood it was still nearly dinner time. We took a stroll down one of the nearby hutongs, or alleyways, which is where Beijing comes to life. Located in a touristy area, this hutong had numerous shops, cafes, and bars catered to expats and internationally minded Chinese.

After dinner at a restaurant in the hutong and showers / pregame drinks at the hotel, we headed out to a local bar we’d learned about online. We got to the correct street and reached what we thought was the place, a matchbox with an outdoor patio and relaxed vibe. There were only a dozen customers, but that was enough for the place to feel full. After ordering a drink we realized this wasn’t the right spot, but hey, it was a good pit stop anyway. When we found our original destination—another small, cozy joint—it was empty, but we had a drink for good measure.

We never did find the next place on our list, and while standing on the corner waiting for what felt like forever for a taxi to show, I thought the night might be over. Luck came our way when a small moto cab agreed to take us to Sanlitun, a nightlife area some 5 kilometers away. There we ambled along the main drag and chose the busiest place, a Latin-themed bar with a small dance floor and majority expat crowd. After one more watering hole it was nearly 4 am and the bed was calling, so we hopped on another makeshift taxi back to the guesthouse.

Sunday we checked out the 798 Art District, an old industrial area now full of art studios, quirky shops, and eclectic outdoor art. Disused factory buildings and neglected train cars sit alongside galleries and sculptures. It took us two transfers and a 45 minute walk (it was a roundabout way), but the afternoon excursion was a refreshing surprise in a city known primarily for traffic, temples, and Communist party bigwigs.

Posing on the tracks by the now defunct rail yard.

Old concrete shell: a good photo opp for Joanna!

There was a lot of graffiti in 798... 

...and some strange art.

That evening we ended up back on the same lively hutong near our guesthouse for dinner. This time round we ordered a pizza to go. It was advertised as the biggest in Beijing, and although we only got a medium, my skepticism was put to rest when I saw the size of our pie. It was thin crust but still lasted us two meals apiece. (I don’t want to make it seem like we never eat Chinese food—we do—but it’s often simple local places, things that I’ve had in Hangzhou before, so the foreign meals are the unusual ones in a way).

Stuffed from our traditional Beijing pizza, we hopped on the metro to Wangfujing Street. Joanna wanted to show me the Donghuamen Night Market, where tourists can buy souvenirs and exotic foods. I’d like to say Joanna wanted to show me the market because she was a caring tour guide (she visited Beijing a few years back). But the real reason was because she wanted to make me try a snake. The market has many bizarre animals to snack on, including starfish, insects, snakes, and live scorpions. The only snake we could find was the shell and not the meat itself, so I lucked out and Joanna missed her opportunity.

Scorpions or starfish, anyone?

From the market we wandered through the Wangfujing shopping area to a metro, and then to Houhai Lake. The lake reflected bright lights of the shops, restaurants, and bars lining its edge, with thousands of tourists ambling along the bank. Joanna and I stopped for a pricey mixed drink ($10) at a lakeside bar. Soon after we got our drinks, two strippers appeared for a dance performance; well they never got naked, although they were in underwear, so I guess it’d be more accurate to simply call them pole dancers.

One drink was enough for our budget, and we eventually settled on a reggae bar where drinks were a third the price. There was just enough room to squeeze in an acoustic band, and with 20 patrons the joint was full. We spent a few hours lounging on one of the two couches with rum and cokes, and before grabbing a taxi for the guesthouse got another round of late night BBQ (this one wasn’t as good as our spots in Hangzhou though!).

Late night BBQ outside the reggae bar. We usually stick to veggies and seafood; the meat looks a bit dodgy

Saturday and Sunday had been lovely weather—dry and hot—but clouds and rain came Monday. We spent the late morning and early afternoon under umbrellas at the Forbidden City, then walked back to Wangfujing street for a late lunch. We had a few hours on our hands, but considering our fatigue from a weekend of late nights and sightseeing, in addition to the crappy weather, we called it a wrap and prepared to head to the airport.

Grounds of the Imperial Palace

The metro was a great way to reach the airport, better than waiting for the cab when we arrived, and far better than our normal cross city trek in Hangzhou. Our early start gave us ample time to check our bags and have dinner. We boarded our flight without issue, but once we took are seats and were good to go we sat. And sat. And sat…for two hours before lift-off. Because of the delay (due to a storm in Hangzhou) we didn’t make it back to our neck of the woods until after midnight, and Joanna had a class at 7:40 the next morning!

The traffic and travel delays were a pain in the ass, but once we finally got to our destination I had a lot of fun in Beijing. We have one more long weekend in June, then that’s all she wrote, so hopefully I can make one more trip away from Hangzhou before the year’s over.