Many flights of Air China to Asia from Europe include a layover in Peking. And did you know what: most of the time, it’s not much more expensive to extend the layover to 1-3 days. This is what we did on our way to Malaysia and I can only recommend it, although it needs some preparation and will come with quite some communication barriers. All information on the required organization to be found here (and believe me, a lot of things in China work differently from the rest of the world!) so here comes your plan for a perfect 2-day- layover in Beijing China .
Entry Regulations
Since the 1.12.2023 there is no visa requirement for 15 days anymore for certain nationalities. Countries like Germany and Italy belong to that. This trial period for now goes until end of November 2024, so anytime after that inform yourself about updates. China wants to push tourism a bit. But even for many other nationalities, a 72-hour-layover is usually visa free, so the layover is a great opportunity to explore the forbidden city as well as the Chinese wall!
Other Necessary Preparations:
Remember that WhatsApp, Instagram and many other apps won’t be working in China without a VPN. Also recall that for certain attractions, such as the forbidden city, you need to reserve tickets at least 1 day in advance.
Common apps to use are:
- WeChat: instead of WhatsApp, you need an authorization from a current user in order to create your profile
- AliPay: to pay, you need a credit card to use it – I heavily recommend preparing it in advance as it made the whole trip a lot easier: we managed to not use cash at all and only pay via this app!
- MetroApp: There is also a metro app of Peking, which can be used
- Waze or another maps app: If you don’t have the VPN download yourself another map app to get some orientation. There might be offline options available too.
- Google Translate: download the offline translation of Chinese-English, so to communicate. Most people will not be speaking English.
Transport from Airport to Hotel/Central Peking for the layover in Beijing China:
You have several ways to get from the airport into the city center:
- Taxi: book your taxi via Alipay! That I would generally recommend as otherwise they will be trying to charge you too much. A taxi should cost you max. 100 Yen.
- Subway/Metro: there is also the metro you can take. A single ticket for the AirPort Express is about 25Yen, any ticket after 2-3Yen.
Acommodation:
Higher class: Hotel Jen: if you have a bit more to spend, this hotel for sure is one of the nicest. With one of the best hotel gyms I have ever seen for sure and an amazing breakfast.
More budget friendly: Happy Dragon Alley Hotel: more budget friendly with good reviews, also included breakfast in the center of the city.
Day 1: Chinese Wall, Badaling
We arrived at 6:30 am in the morning with an overnight flight from Frankfurt. Despite not having slept too much, we went to our hotel and aimed at immediately getting to the Chinese wall.
There are different parts of the Chinese Wall and different ways to get there, we opted for the independent transportation, which proved to be great (as you can use your own timing and will avoid the crowds) and for the Badaling The Great Chinese Wall Part.
You can get to the wall by bus, train or taxi, which I would suggest adapting to your group travel size.
A taxi will cost you around 150-220 Yen and will take about 70-90 minutes depending on your start of journey. We used it for our way there.
The bus going to Badaling is 919 & the train is the S2, which is leaving from North station.
Around Badaling entrance you have a free shuttle bringing you to the immediate start of the wall, from which you can start exploring (the entrance ticket per person in the off season costs about 35 Yen). We walked around the wall for 2ish hours, however this is totally subject to personal preference. You might decide to have seen enough after 1 hour or spend 5-6 hours exploring. We arrived around 2:30/3 and left around 4:30/5 as it’s closing earlier in the winter season. This, I think though, is the BEST time to visit, as the light will be the prettiest, we had parts of the wall in which we were completely alone and all the group travels will be over!
Depending on the season of visit, dress warm enough though. We’ve been January 6, we had -6 degrees and the wind can be super strong – my feet felt like falling off.
To get back we tried to take the bus 919. We didn’t have internet around the wall and weren’t really trusting the pushy taxi drivers so we felt more secure with that option. The bus ends around Deshengmen or somewhere, so you’ll either have to take the taxi or metro from there (we opted for the taxi).
Day 2: Forbidden City and take off!
On the second day we enjoyed our breakfast at the hotel and made our way to get our pre booked Forbidden City ticket. Now called the palace museum, it is an old palace by one of the old regimes. It very big to visit, so plan 2 hours (we rushed through it in 1, but 2 are definitely better). Arrive with the metro line 1 or the taxi and go around Donghuamen Street to enter. It is generally a nice little street with a lot of restaurants and cute little Chinese shops.
And then…. take the taxi back to the airport or from the hotel.
Additional things to do during the layover in Beijing China:
In case your hotel is not in that area, don’t miss out on the CCTV Headquarters 2008, one of the most impressive architectural buildings in Beijing.
Restaurants/Food:
We got most of our food from the mall next to the hotel, but I can recommend the following places as we either got them recommended or ate there ourselves:
•Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant: one of the most famous ones
•小吊梨汤: one of the more local ones, very typical food
•Din Tai Fung: Great dumplings, wonton and Baos
Generally I looove Chinese food! It’s so good and you will definitely have fun exploring a bit!
Try the Peking duck of course, eat some Wontons with chili sauce, some Baos with egg custard as well as with pork or vegetables and the dumplings with shrimp are so so good!!! If you can also go for a hot pot with friends or fellow travelers!
People:
We experienced very high language barriers. Almost no one that we met spoke English, and if, often just a couple of words. Even though many people were very closed off and seemed rather skeptical towards us, many other people were super helpful, shared their hotspots for internet with us and were happy so somehow help. I don’t regret not having bought a SIM card because many encounters really only happened because we had to approach the locals as already mentioned more on the closed off side.
Time of visit for the best layover in Beijing China:
January was very cold. If you’re sensitive to temperature maybe go a bit later in the year. BUT as it was very sunny all the time, I also enjoyed seeing everyone in their winter clothing, the Chinese have a great great variety of different hats: from rabbit to frog hats, I promise you you will see all kind of styles and Peking during that time of the year was very cozy.
That was it with my layover in Beijing China!
So, I hope you enjoyed the itinerary inspiration, I would be happy to read your comments and get feedback!
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