A Weekend in Beijing: Forbidden City & Slow Boat Brewery

Our next day in Beijing was mostly spent at the Forbidden city. That place is massive! Like oh my goodness when does it end huge! It was also really interesting to see. I could have done with a few less people, but in a city of 21.5 million you just have to get used to it.


Before heading into the Forbidden City we walked around in Tiananmen Square.

This is the back side of the building in the above picture.

There was a lot of walking (and people stopping to look at Baby O) and two check points to get to this point and we hadn't even gotten our tickets yet. Tickets in hand and we had one more security check point to go though before getting into the Forbidden City. There wasn't much information or signage around the city, I wish that I had done some research before visiting. J had visited a month prior and decided this time he would get the audio tour. He said that it wasn't as informative as he had hopped.

We entered the Forbidden City though the Meridian Gate to an enormous courtyard. There is a stream going through it called the 'Golden Stream' with five bridges going over it. We headed to the west side of the courtyard to visit the calligraphy and painting gallery in the Hall of Martial Valor (middle picture above).

Next we passed though the Gate of Supreme Harmony to the heart of the Forbidden City. Baby O and I are standing in front of the Hall of Supreme Harmony. This is the largest and most important building in the Forbidden City.

At the very back of the Forbidden City there is a garden. It was similar to other Chinese gardens. We got an ice cream and enjoyed a little bit of shade before leaving the city.

We were in need of a good beer after all that walking we did, so we walked some more to Slow Boat Brewery. The beer was good and the air conditioning was great! Baby O loved being out of the carrier and walking around the small bar.

We had a great time in Beijing, but we will definitely need to go back. There are SO many things we didn't get to: Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven Park and the Capitol Museum just to name a few.