Day Nineteen - Jun 14, 2013
Beijing, China
Daily Didactic
Our last touristing day in Beijing and, frankly, we're not sure how many more we could handle. We seldom pull off four days of targeted tourism, but Beijing has a lot of to dos. Today we headed to the Summer Palace. We rose a little early, buoyed by yesterday's Great Wall success. Today's trek bridged two metro lines and passed something like seventeen stops. It was really long subway ride. We got off the metro and immediately headed (wait for it...) in the correct direction. Not that we didn't talk about turning around, it just seemed so unlikely. The summer palace was a mix of muted theme park and ancient temples and gardens. It was grand and more than a little overwhelming. As a single venue, the Summer Palace again really makes the royalty thing look compelling. We worked our way in the main gate, around the gift shop ridden Suzhou Market Street, up Longevity Hill and down to the Long Corridor. We made a point to visit the Garden of Virtue and Harmony and the Gallery of Literary Prosperity, because they were on our "inclusive" ticket. On the way back, we climbed the hill to the Tower of Buddhist Incense. While we wouldn't trade the visit for sleeping in, we were excited to be "done". We caught the metro back to our hutong and Brian spent the afternoon sipping beverages while Theresa sketched for Cindy's guest book. In the evening we had one last really fun dinner with Cindy and Nick of fish head soup and a table of other artfully selected dishes. Our stay in Beijing wouldn't have been nearly as fun without their company. We hit the hay a little late for an early morning plane.
Today's Photos
