Originally Posted by Alka

Greetings!

Mrs. Alka and I are traveling to Beijing for a 13-day visit -- pretty much a once-in-a-lifetime trip for us. I've looked through the stickies and, quite frankly, it's a little overwhelming.

We arrive at PEK very late on Dec. 21, have the next day to recover from FRA-LHR-DFW-ORD-PEK (used four SWUs to upgrade on AA; thus, the routing), scheduled a small group day trip to the Great Wall on Dec. 23 and a private tour of Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven and a Tea Ceremony on Dec. 26 -- the basic tourist stuff. Other than that, we are wide open until our Jan. 3 return to FRA.

We're staying at the Beijing Hilton at 1 Dong Fang Road.

I'd appreciate any and all suggestions for trips, tours, sightseeing, etc. Our visa allows us two entries so I'd like to take a night or two to visit somewhere else -- Hong Kong (preferably), Tokyo, or whatever.

We'd like to visit the Terracotta Warriors and will make arrangements through Hilton's concierge to do that.

The biggest issue, and pretty much the reason for this thread, is my wife seems to have heard from anyone and everyone who has visited China that we need someone to guide us around anytime we leave the hotel. If there's ever been a problem, she's heard about it and thinks it will happen to us.

Can I get something from the China/Beijing experts to reassure her that basic precautions one would take when visiting any foreign city or country is more than enough for this visit? I'm finding it hard to overcome fear of the unknown (and stories of problems) with common sense.

Thanks for any advice, suggestions, ideas, recommendations, constructive criticism, or whatever, you can provide.

Warm regards,