Day 2 - More Beijing

Day 2 was a bit more adventurous than Day 1. We started with a visit to the Temple of Heaven, pictured here to the left. The Temple itself is situated inside a very large park. As impressive as the Temple is, I enjoyed our stroll through the park even more.
It appears to be a common weekend excursion for Beijingers, and we had the opportunity to observe lots of people engaged in a variety of activities, including a hacky sack like game using something akin to an oversized badminton birdie, a different game Ciana engaged in above, numerous karaoke singers, a large choral group singing what I suspect were Chinese folks songs, and even a few old ladies singing Chinese opera.
We could faintly hear these ladies singing as we strolled through the beautiful rose garden pictured here. Combined with the light mist falling, it made for an other worldly feel.

Following our visit to the Temple of Heaven, we encountered our first language based snafu. It was easy enough to show our taxi driver the Summer Palace on our map and get him to understand that as our destination. As we set out, an idea seemed to strike our driver and he pulled over to show me the map. He traced a route that went from the Temple of Heaven along several roads and then along a road that ran beside a canal up to the Temple of Heaven. I assumed he was either confirming the route with me, or indicating a faster route that would require a toll. Unable to learn more, I nodded acceptance.

Twenty minutes or so later we pulled into a park entrance, and he walked us up to the ticker booth. Our concern started to rise when they charged us more than we had expected for entry. As we passed through the turnstile, a woman came out to show us the way. We feared that we had just inadvertently purchased a guide, who spoke no English. This fear was soon replaced by even greater uncertainty when we spotted an English sign, welcoming us not to the Summer Palace, but to the Zizuyuan Park. Before we could find a way to express our concern to our new guide, we arrived at a canal with several boats. There, English signage made it clear that what we had actually purchased was a canal boat ride to the Summer Palace.


Much later we actually arrived at the Summer Palace, where we had to significantly curtail our visit, arriving as we did at the wrong end and with little time until our required departure time. At least Maureen and I got to see aspects of Beijing we’d not seen our 3 previous visits. Even the girls were able to all laugh it off. We’re still divided on whether our taxi driver was truly trying to show us more of Beijing, forgoing some of his own fee in the process, or whether he received a healthy kick back from the canal boat operators. We suspect the latter, but he seemed such a kindly old gent.
The day ended with a hair raising drive in 2 taxis up to Red Capital Ranch at speeds briefly approaching 160 km/hr, with the two drivers chatting back and forth on the cell phones while dodging around traffic. The worries of the day soon passed away as we passed the gate of the Red Capital Ranch… a small piece of Chinese paradise I’ll write more about tomorrow.