Beijing, China!

Friday 14 October

We arrived in Beijing at 22:30 but it was 2 hours after until we finally made it to the hotel. This is because arriving in Beijing the ground staff wanted all the passengers who are traveling from Africa to go through quarantine and this took so long because all the Chinese passengers were trying to get out first.

As soon as we got to the hotel I went straight to bed. The only problem was, I felt super tired but I couldn’t fall asleep. While it was already past midnight in Beijing but it was only 8 pm in Dubai. My alarm went on at 6am. I did not sleep well at all! Tossing and Turning it was horrible. But I bid for Beijing and I was going to go sightseeing even if I didn’t sleep! It’s scary when I was checking the weather app it says hazardous air quality during the early morning. We met in the lobby at 6:30 I went to the breakfast buffet and had some fried rice and an egg. I know it’s strange to have for breakfast but it looked very appetizing to me for that time of day. We met in the lobby and made our way for the 2-hour drive to see the Great Wall Of China. It was a very quite drive because we were all asleep the driver had some pretty loud Chinese music on but it was relaxing.

We finally arrived we had to take a separate shuttle bus to the cable lifts. From there we took a chair lift up to the Great Wall. We saw these adorable panda hat/scarf so the 3 of us got them the other 2 weren’t that interested. So we were the 3 Panda gang!! The Great Wall was truly one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen! There were really steep steps it was hard to walk up and especially the polluted air wasn’t helping. It’s not as bad as it was in the city. The view of mountains beyond mountains was amazing. It was a bit foggy but we were still able to see into the distance where the Great Wall stretched. After walking around on the wall we stopped by a restaurant for some Chinese Beer and dumplings! I was craving for dumplings since I saw Beijing on my Roster!

We wanted to take the slide back down we were all very excited for this. But as we were waiting in line the man says that they can’t allow anyone to slide down now because it’s raining. We were all confused because it wasn’t raining. So we thought maybe he meant the rain is coming. So we took the chair lift back down. We got back to the car and of course, all fall asleep. The ride back was a bit longer there was more traffic. We stopped by an ATM machine near the hotel so that we could pay the driver. It was around 15:00 by the time we got to the hotel still too early to go to bed. So some went straight to bed while the rest of us went to Carrefour to grab some food. I got some yummy snacks that I used to eat in my childhood living in Taiwan. We dropped our shopping off at the hotel and decided to go for a massage. We found a place and for 300 RMB for 110 Min massage. It was quite painful but also ticklish and at one point I fell asleep as usual. We made our way back to the hotel it was already 8am. Our wake-up call is at 4 am. I called for some room service Fried rice and they added delicious spicy Asian pickles on the side. While waiting for dinner I had a nice hot shower, ate then went to bed. I slept like a baby panda!

The flight back we passed by The Himalayas! It was beautiful! Let the picture speak for itself! Times like this I am truly grateful for my job!

Thanks for reading!