doesun

My cousin and his group of friends (total 8 people) visiting Beijing this past Sunday and hired a van and driver for about 8 hours for 600RMB on Monday to visit the Great Wall and Ming Tombs. Fee included pickup from their hotel (4 Points Sheraton in Hadian), to Great Wall (initially Badaling but friends wanted Mutianyu, driver shrugged cuz its on the other side of the city) and back to the Ming Tombs and then drop-off back at hotel. Driver wanted to get off at 6pm. They told me they tipped the driver 50RMB.

adidasxk

You can email us direct at [email protected] and we can take care of the booking.

Let us know if there is anything else we can help with. Have you joined our Fairmont President's Club, well join in for free and you get the benefits as well.

Fairmont Beijing team

allset2travel

Despite characterized as "cookie-cutter hotel", I think the Courtyard in the Chongwen District has its virtues. I do like its location and its surroundings (close to shops, restaurants, & most importantly subway station.
The hotel is far better than its rates would indicate. My own experience at this property dates back to July, 2008, prior to the 08 Olympics. As MR Plat, I was treated with a great upgrade to a jr suite. The daily breakfast (comp'd) in the restaurant was fantastic, including certain items cooked to order. Service is slightly lacking compared to the JW, but its average nonetheless.
CL is typical with international CY, again a notch below the Marriott West & way below the JW. But for less than half the rates of the others, so that's value.
About sight-seeing. I concur with a prior post, except for a private car/driver to the GW (I paid 500 RMB for service found just outside the hotel, not thru concierge), you can easily do the rest on your own w/o a guide. Most guides tend to guide you toward shopping.

8dimsum

We were in Beijing last year, April, and we stayed at two different hotels. Our cruise/tour had us staying at the Shangri-la Hotel Beijing. We wanted to have more days in BJ, so we went earlier and stayed at the Park Plaza Wanfujing. It was located behind the Regent, 2 upmarket car dealers (Jaguar? Ferrari?) a Starbucks was in the courtyard across from the hotel.

Nice easy walk to Wanfujing. Across the street was the often photographed streetside eateries: starfish, various meatballs, ears of corn, scorpions on a stick.... Sorry I don't remember the name of the main street.

The Park Plaza has a cosy Club Level ... nice breakfast selection, happy hour in PMs, tea/coffee service and a couple of computer stations.

We thought staff provided excellent service and were fluent in English. We did not try their restaurants. We would definitely return to the PP for future BJ stays.

Villavic

I'm interested to hire a driver (no guide) to spend the day at Great Wall. I read previous threads about costs but what I still doubt is.. where do I look for them? Websites? outside the hotel (I guess not)?

Is Summer Palace recommended also to go with a driver? Or are there public easy transports?

Villavic

moondog

Outside the hotel is often a decent strategy. Otherwise, I know I've posted at least a handful of phone numbers in the driver threads and others have as well.


For the Summer Palace and optionally Wudaokou area, I would just grab a taxi, though traffic can get really ugly up there. Assuming you're planning on visiting the Great Wall, you might want to hire a driver to take you there and drop you off at the Summer Palace on the way back.

Peter_N-H

Not outside the hotel, no. Get your hotel to write down in Chinese for you which part of the Wall you want to see, the date you want to go, the place you want to be picked up, the time you want to start, the place you want to be dropped off, the time you want to be back, and the price you want to pay. As you travel around town in your first day or two, simply show this paper to drivers you like the look of. You'll usually come to a deal fairly swiftly. Pay attention to the supervision card displayed on the dashboard. The later the number (i.e. beginning 26 or 27) the less experience the driver has. Look for numbers beginning 16 or earlier. These drivers have usually been everywhere, and while that means that some have bad habits from the days when they could get away with demanding any price they chose and not starting the meter, most are reliable and accommodating, and you can simply ignore those with an inflated idea of the price for their services (typically long-term drivers of hong qi 'red flag' saloons).

For Mutianyu you should be offering Ą350. For Badaling a little more, and for the further afield locations, such as Jin Shan Ling Ą500. I came back from Beijing 48 hours ago having spent a month on assorted research including re-verifying these prices with several drivers. (Naturally some will try it on for a great deal more since there's nothing to be lost and many a foreigner will cough up in ignorance of the basic economics, but there are 67,500 taxis out there...)

Metro to Bei Gong Men on Line 4 is by far the quickest, most convenient, and cheapest method, costing you precisely Ą2 from wherever you start, and dropping you right outside the Summer Palace north gate, or less then ten minutes' work from the Main Gate (Dōng Gōng Mén) past the entrance to the Aman Summer Palace (which is well worth a look).

Peter N-H
China

yuchung5

Very helpful.
Questions about taxi.
Mutianyu for Ą350 and Jin Shan Ling for Ą500. I am assuming this is round trip price from Beijing downtown, right?
So just try to negotiate with taxi driver?

Thanks

Peter_N-H

Yes. Note the instructions suggest what time you want to be back, when, and where.

As I said: 'Simply show this paper to drivers you like the look of. You'll usually come to a deal fairly swiftly.'

Peter N-H

tylorcl

There are lots of hotels in Beijing, different brands from economy class to luxious hotel. It really depends on your budget( or you will use your hotel points), where you want visit in the city( the city is big).

You can also take a look at the www.ctrip.com to find the hotel of your choice.

Boddingtons

Does anyone know of, or have any suggestions, as to hotels in beijing that have a decent outdoor pool area?

I've had no look in finding as yet. All pools seem to be indoor.

jiejie

Almost none in Beijing have outdoor pool--the weather and outdoor pollution conditions aren't too cooperative for much of the year. The only one coming to mind right now is the Sino-Swiss Hotel near the airport.

moondog

I also love outdoor pools and have spent many summers in BJ. Especially early in the swimming season, some of the public pools are quite nice (e.g. Chaoyang Park and Tuanjiehu). And, assuming you can swim 200 meters nonstop, the Gongti pool remains clean throughout the summer. I don't think Sino Swiss is worth a special trip. The Goose and Duck ranch, on the other hand, is further out, but has a great pool.... might be able to work it into a Great Wall trip.

kamchatsky

We are looking at going to Beijing close to Christmas time (22-27 December). Given that China does not celebrate Xmas, and it is freezing cold there in winter, I thought the prices of hotels there should not be too expensive .....

However, looking at a number of international 5* hotels (Hilton, SPG, IHG) they seemed to go at about 1400CNY+ per night. The prices seemed very high. Is this normal? Or I should wait until later when there is on sale, or their prices will drop as it gets closer to Christmas? I am looking at central Beijing (Wangfujiang areas and anywhere else close by).

moondog

Did you try any corporate codes?