Beijing

I had never been to Shanghai or Hong Kong before, and I was expecting exactly what I found – lovely modern cities.  But I had visited Beijing back in 1993 when I did a trip following the Silk Road across the country. Even though I knew of the many changes since then, I was blown away by what I saw in Beijing.   Gone were the thousands of bicyclists.  Gone were the low-rise homes and business through narrow, tangled streets. Instead what I found was a beautiful, clean, well-designed city; I marveled at what this city has become in 20 short years. 

There was a 3-day national holiday going on while we were there so traffic was heavy and sites crowded.  I skipped some of it as I didn’t think the Forbidden City or Tiananmen Square would have changed since I was here last.  The Summer Palace & gardens (below) was just as pretty as I remembered but there were crazy numbers of people out enjoying the day.  By the way, the temperature was unusually warm (mid-70s), trees were flowering and smog levels quite low.  Blue sky above for some of our stay.   How lucky we were! 

 

 

Non fruit-bearing peach trees lined parts of the walkways with their puffy pink flowers in full bloom.

 

 

On the drive out to the Great Wall, we drove past a park where they were flying kites. at first glance I thought I was seeing lots of picnic tables then realized they were all ping-pong tables.  Many more than what you see in this photo. 

Into the hills just south of Mongolia and the wall that was once used to resisted the invaders from the  north.

 

I visited the Jinshanling section of the Great Wall with my travel agency where we had a lovely lunch on the wall.  It was a pretty special day and the weather could not have been nicer for us. 

 

 

 

The other thing that I wanted to mention are the trees.  China has always had a problem with dry conditions and blowing winds from the Gobi dessert.  In an attempt to better protect the lands, they started a tree-planting program about 30 years ago.  Every Arbor Day everyone plants trees – millions of them every year.  It was amazing to see.  Poplars seem to be quite popular, but also weeping willows, various flowering trees and more.  They’re everywhere in tidy rows and you see people out there tending to them.  Small and large swaths of land are covered with trees - in the city and the countryside.  Quite something to see.