Finally We Go Beijing: Day 7, Back to Beijing and Mall Crawling

Merry Christmas! 

The hotel staff had asked the night before if she can just make one set of the 小菜 as it didn’t look like we had much of them the morning before. Speaking of which, the hotel staff had the leftovers the morning before and when I went to the dining room to ask them some questions, the 3 of them had so much 小菜 on their table. It didn’t look like they would be able to finish the spread and it was indeed much wastage.

Nana and I started the morning with a 30 mins HiiT. She only completed half of it and complained about muscle aches for the next few days. Lol. HiiT is more powerful than the Great Wall hike.

This was our 1 share of 小菜 and we still cannot finish. Lol. Too exotic for us ah. The bacons and sausages beside were a lot more appealing. Those, we didn’t have a problem.

We requested for the luggage to be transported to the main gate and had to pack up early to cater for transportation time. 

Then it was roaming of the town. It was about 10am but the town was very quiet. There was barely any Christmasy mood.

Bye to our hotel room. 

To the frozen drains and canals. 

And the ice that had been poked so many times by people who rode the ice chair. Lol.

We found a quiet alley for IG worthy photos. 

It was too cold and it seems like we will never get used to this Beijing coldnes.. I was told numerous times that this winter is already warmer than usual thus the lack of snow. Speaking of which, it did snow in Beijing City Center a few days ago. We missed it. Anyway, I don’t think we can retire in China. Hohoho. We decided to hide in the Starbucks for the remaining time over nice cake and drinks and nice warmth.

 Bye to the 摆渡车 and the 古北水镇. 

The bus parking lot was about 300m away from the main gate. We were told to cross the 狮子桥. 

Our luggage were already waiting and we got into the bus alright. There were other tourists who didn’t bring cash and were panicking. Heng we sorted that issue out yday. 

The bus was heated and soon the jackets were coming off. 

The bus was not full and I happily ask Daddy Lim to move to the seat in front. It was super cramp with the tight seats and layers… or did we already grew sideways in the week that we were in Beijing?!!? Hoho. 

The bus ride took 2 hours. I had time to blog, play candy crush and check emails. The kids found the library app working and started reading ebooks and had been super engrossed the whole time. Time passed quickly and we arrived back in Beijing City Center safe and sound. I was glad to see that our hotel was not far away and took another didi. 

Our hotel - Renjoy Hotel, was hidden in a small alley way. It was so narrow and it really takes some good driving skills to drive into the alleyway. 

Our hotel for the next 2 nights. 

Our room comes with a double bed and a super single bed on the loft. 

Nana and I squeezed into the upper loft bed for the 2 nights.

We made our way for mall crawling and wanted to find a mall to buy cheap(er) track shoes. I saw the Uptown Mall on 小红书 but was told by the hotel staff that it was a distant away. 

We were pointed to the Raffles Mall that was about 1km away. 1st, to fill the tummy and we had 烤串. 

We didn’t eat a lot, which explained why Zaky made me buy him more food the moment we arrived at the mall. 

The mall is quite atas and we didn’t find anything to buy, other than small trinkets. Unless if we wanted to buy cars. Daddy Lim was super impressed with the different kinds of EV cars that they have. 

Zaky was impressed with food. 

We walked back to the hotel and I was very tempted to try one of the 小黄车, aka shared bicycle, much to Daddy Lim’s discouragement. I didn’t manage to do so, giving up at the step where the app asked for ID verification. 

The kids were not too hungry and didn’t want to go for dinner. Daddy Lim and I went to tabao. 

We tabaoed 牛肉面 and this fried 串串 back to the hotel. I had been wanting to try to 点外卖 but hadn’t managed to. #beijingbucketlist

Before I went to lala land, I was googling on how to 点外卖 and.if foreigners can loan one of the 小黄车. App for the 外卖 downloaded and just nice, the room that I had booked doesn’t come with complimentary bfast. As for the bicycle, there are the blue, lilac and yellow ones. Foreigners can only loan the blue ones using the Alipay app. Ok, all ready. 

Mummy Lim