Anybody have experience with this city? I fly in at around midnight. My main question is can I go to the great wall being there ready to go at sunrise and make it back to the airport by 1pm?

10/1/2016 3:14:59 PM

I took public transit out of BJ + private taxi (to cut off some time) to Mutianyu and it still took about an hour each way. It was memorable for sure, but if you had to rush through the whole experience... you probably wouldn't get as much out of it and there would be a significant risk that you wouldn't be back by 1pm (traffic holdups are common).

With the limited time, assuming you haven't been, I would recommend taking a taxi from the airport to The Forbidden City. You can walk around Tiananmen Square right across the street (assuming they leave it open all the time) and then enter TFB at 8:30. You can easily spend 3.5 hours there, and take a taxi back to the airport and get there ~1.

[Edited on October 1, 2016 at 6:07 PM. Reason : ]

10/1/2016 6:06:15 PM

Try to find some blue sky through the pollution!

10/2/2016 2:48:35 PM

It's possible if you rent a private car with a driver. You can find a car + english speaking driver on trip advisor. It will cost you about $120 to $150.

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 4:16 PM. Reason : a]

10/4/2016 4:15:41 PM

^^ No, you can't.

10/4/2016 10:04:56 PM

And Mutianyu tends to be really crowded.

And you can see the blue sky when you're on top of the wall

10/4/2016 10:07:53 PM

The Chinese name of this thing is actually "Chang Cheng", which means A Long City. Chang means Long, Cheng means City. It's more of the border of the forbidden city than a defensive wall.

10/4/2016 10:28:58 PM

If you want to avoid crowded tourist places, then Chinese tourist destinations are not the places you should visit.

10/5/2016 11:32:48 PM

wonders of the world tend to be crowded tourist destinations

[Edited on October 5, 2016 at 11:59 PM. Reason : i feel like thats the main thing to see in china ]

10/5/2016 11:58:57 PM

Partially agree.

When you go to Time square, or Universal studio, same thing.

China has the most population density together with India and Europe.

10/6/2016 12:02:48 AM

you're wrong, shoot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_territories_by_population_density

10/6/2016 10:49:07 AM

I mean generally speaking, very general.

[Edited on October 6, 2016 at 10:57 AM. Reason : ;]

10/6/2016 10:56:58 AM

Take some yen with you so you can do some shopping at the vendors with shops set up on the climb up to the wall entrances. Also, for the few vendors who set up shop ON the wall selling super cheap beer (ting tao) and water

[Edited on October 6, 2016 at 12:15 PM. Reason : .]

10/6/2016 12:15:13 PM

Absolutely it's one of the greatest wonders in human history which is still ALIVE.

10/6/2016 12:43:03 PM

^4

10/8/2016 8:55:47 PM