Beijing - Day 3 - The Forbidden City

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The Forbidden City!  A better translation for it would be the Imperial City, but Forbidden makes it sound so much more interesting.  When we arrived, the first thing that happened was Matt and Mary being asked to have their photo taken with a family.  This happened to Mary another 3 times when we were inside!  It happened at the Summer Palace with me too, and I was told I was very beautiful!

The City is enromous.  I can't even describe how big it is because there is nothing in London that it is comparable to.  Possibly the size of Richmond Park.  It has got to be a mile from the entrance to the exit, and all the way there are fabulous buildings everywhere.  You can't go in any of them, but you can look at the interesting ceilings and decorations (there were some stone cows in baths in one) from a crowd that is 10 people deep around a small doorway.

The weather was once again fabulous, and only 80,000 people per day are allowed in, so it was actually quite chilled once your in. It's so huge that everyone spreads out and there is plenty of space.  We had an ice tea in the cafe outside and went into the clock gallery, where there were beautiful, ornate clocks from all over the world.  There is a wonderful garden at the exit end of the city too.

Then it was time to return to Shanghai.  Beijing is a wonderful city, rich in culture and history.  A fabulous place to visit.  We will definitely come back!

We were in nice seats in our own compartment on the train on the way back.  However, we were delayed at the train station by 40 minutes (we went for Pizza Hut), and the journey took nearly 6 hours, so it was a long day.  We got home at about 10pm, and pretty much went straight to bed.