Beijing (China) travel informations: visa, train, hotels

Map of China and chinese territory: Beijing, capital of China

The Chinese capital is often the first (or last) city that tourist visit during their travel to Mongolia. Cultural and economical center of this giant country, Beijing has many things to offer for travelers: exotism, history, culture and traditions. Most traveler planning their trip in the mongolian steppe want to begin their adventure starting in this marvellous world called China. This page is done to give informations for independents travelers who are planning their trip to/from Mongolia. After some day in the Chinese capital, the adventure continues with the 30 hours train to Ulan-Bator, the mongolian capital.

Useful advise if you plan to go in China on your way to Mongolia

1-. Ask a double entry visa if you plan to come back in Beijing after your trip to Mongolia

2-. Ask your Mongolian visa at home or ask it at the mongolian embassy in Beijing

3-. Ask your visa for Russia before arriving in Beijing

4-. Bring American dollars in small currency

5-. Verify the day of departure of the train for Ulaanbaatar

6-. Reserve a place in a hotel for your stay in Beijing

7-. Plan 2-4 days to visit the city and getting your train ticket to Ulaanbaatar

Visa and embassies of China

China - Mongolia by train

How to go to Mongolia

History of Beijing

Climate in Beijing

Budget hotels in Beijing

It’s much easier getting the Chinese visa then it is for Mongolia or Russia. You have to fill the form in the Chinese embassy, pay the fees and prove that you will leave the country. During your travel in Mongolia, if you’re planning to come back to Beijing, don’t forget to ask a double entry visa for China. In Mongolia this will avoid many hassles in the Mongolian capital trying to get the Chinese visa. You can save some time that you will spend in the Mongolian countryside. This visa is a little more expensive but it worth asking it from your home country. In the Chinese embassy of Ulaanbaatar, don’t expect anyone speak English or any other languages then Chinese and Mongolian.

This journey begin at 7h00 am and last for 30 hours. This incredible journey will make you discover the North part of China, cross the Great wall, see the sunrise in the Gobi desert. This trip is everything but boring. At the Chinese and mongolian border will wait some time (3 hours) because the staff changes the wheel. The distance between the 2 railways are different in Mongolia. This was done to avoid any incursion of the Chinese army in the mongolian territory.

The next morning, you can admire the mongolian desert and the exotic landscape (camel, antilop, mongolian herder and yurts, abandoned building, etc…) You arrive at 13h15 where some representant of Guest house are waiting you to offer nice deal. If you are planning to have a tour in Mongolia, that’s the place our representant will be waiting you.

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Embassy of China in Australia

15 Coronation Drive, Yarralumla, ATC 2600

Tel: 02-6273-4780, 6273-4781

Embassy of China in Austria

Metterichgasse 4, 1030 Vienna,

Tel:06-713-6706

Embassy of Belgium

Boulevard General Jacques 19, 1050 Bruxelles Tel: 02-640-4006

Embassy of China in Canada

515 St-Patrick str. Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 5H3

Tel:1-613-789-3509

Embassy of China in Denmark

Oregards Alle 25, 2900 Hellerup, Copenhagen Tel:039-625806

Embassy of China in France

11 avenue George V, 75008, Paris

Tel: 01-47232677

Embassy of China in Germany

Kurfürstenalle 125300 Bonn 2 Tel: 0228-361-095

Embassy of China in Hungary

Budapest VI-1068 Tel:122-4872

Embassy of China in Italy

00135 Roma Via Della Camillucia 613, Roma

Tel:06-3630-3856

Embassy of China in Japan

3-4-33 Moto-Azabu, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106

Tel:03-3403-3380

Embassy of China in Netherlands

Adriaan Goekooplaan 7, 2517 JX The Hague

Tel:070-355-1515

Embassy of China in New Zealand

104A Korokoro Rd, Petone, Wellington

Tel: 04-587-0407

Embassy of China in Poland

00-203 Warsaw St. Bonifraterska 1

Tel: 313836

Embassy of China in Singapore

70 Dalvey Rd Tel:734-3361

Embassy of China in South Korea

83 Myong-dong 2-ga, Chung-gu

Tel:02-319-5101

Embassy of China in Spain

Arturo Soria 111, 28043 Madrid

Tel:341-519-4242

Embassy of China in Sweden

Ringvagen 56, 18134 Lidingo

Tel: 08-767-8740

Embassy of China in Switzerland

7 JV Widmannstrasse, 3074 Muri Bern

Tel: 031-951-1401

Embassy of China in UK

31 Portland Place, London, W1N 5AG

Tel: 0171-636-9756

Embassy of China in USA

2300 Connecticut Ave NW, Washington DC, 20008

Tel: 202-328-2517

Consulate and embassy of China abroad

There is two main ways (and many other unknown) to go Mongolia. The first one is to take the international train. The other way to go to Mongolia is to take the plane. You can find air ticket to Ulaanbaatar (ULN: international airport code) with MIAT (Mongolian airline company) and Air China. The price is about 500 US (425 Euros) for both way. You can book your ticket in a travel agency in Beijing.

Some adventurer will start their trip in Beijing heading to Mongolia using local transportations until the mongolian-chinese border. You will arrive in the city or Erlian (China) and manage to cross the border to Zamyn Uud (Mongolia). Once in Mongolia, locals trains or small buses often go to Ulan-Bator. The cost for this journey may be about 20-25 US but you’ll have to find your way in many strange and small Chinese and mongolian cities. For more information on how to go to Mongolia, go the section INFORMATIONS MONGOLIA.

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The earliest records of settlement date from around 1000 BC, It developed as a frontier trading town for the Mongols, Koreans and the tribes from Shangdong Province and Central China. By the Warring States Period (453-221 BC) it had grown to be the capital of Yan Kingdom and was called Ji, a reference to the marshy features of the area. The town underwent a number of changes as it acquired new warlords, the Khitan Mongols and the Manchurians Jurchen tribes among them. What attracted the conquerors was the strategic position of the town on the edge of the North China plain. During Liao Dynasty (916-1125 AD) Beijing was referred to as Yanjing (Capital of Yan).

In the 1215 the great Genghis Khan, leader of the growing Mongolian empire, razed everything in sight. From the ashes emerged Dadu (know as Khanbalikh) By 1279, Genghis grandson Kubilaï had made himself ruler of the largest empire the world had never known. Thus was China’s Yuan Dynasty (1215-1368 AD).

When the Mongols emperor was informed by his astrologers that the old site of Beijing was a breeding ground for rebels, he shifted his capital furher North. The great palace he built no longer remains, but was visited by Marco Polo, the great Italian traveler. Polo was also amazed by the innovations of gunpowder and paper money.

During the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) which followed, the city was rechristened Beiping (Northern Peace), though for the next 35 years the imperial capital was situated in Nanjing.

In the early 1400s Zhu’s son Young Le shuffled the court back to Beiping and renamed it Beijing (Northern capital). Millions of tales of silver were spent on refurbishing the city. Many of Beijing’s most famous structures, like the Forbidden City and Tiantan, were first build in Young Le’s reign. In fact, he is credited with being the true architect of the modern city. The Inner City of Beijing grew to encircle the imperial compound, and suburban zone was added to the south. The basic laid grid of present-day Beijing had been laid.

Under the Mandchus, who invaded China and established the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), and particularly during the reigns of the emperors Kangxi and Qianlong, Beijing was expanded and renovated; summer palaces, pagodas and temples were built.

In the last 120 years of Manchus rule, Beijing and much China were subject to invaders and rebels: the Anglo-french troops, who in 1860 marched in and burnt the old Summer Palace to the ground: the disastrous Boxer Rebellion of 1900 against the corrupt regime of Emperess Dowager Cixi (1834-1908), who grabbed control of the dragon throne in 1860. When Cixi died, she bequeathed power to a two years old boy, Puyi, who was to be last emperor. The Qing, brutal and incompetent at the best of times, was now rudderless and quickly collapsed. The revolution of 1911 ostensibly brought the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) to power and the Republic of China was declared with Sun Yatsen as president. However, real power remained in the hands of warlords who carved China up into their own fiefdoms. One such warlords, General Yuan Shikai, tried to declare himself emperor in Beijing during 1915.

Yuan’s scheme ended abruptly when he died in 1916, but other warlords continued to control most of northern China while Kuomintan held power in the south. The country was badly splintered by private Chinese armies, while foreigners controlled importants economic zones in major ports like Shanghai and Tianjin.

China’s continuing poverty, bachwardness and control by warlords and foreigners was a recipe for rebellion, Beijing University became a hot bed of intellectual dissent attracting scholars from all over China. Karl Marx and his manifest became the basis for countless discussion groups. One of those attending was a library assistant named Mao Zedong (1893-1976). The communists including Mao Zedong, later established a power base in Shanghai and entered into an uneasy alliance with the Kuomintang to reunify China.

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The best period to visit Beijing is from September to November when there is fewer tourist. The perfect way to take advantage of the weather in Mongolia and after in China is to go in the mongolian steppe in august and finishing your trip in September in Beijing. Winter is also a great period to visit Beijing if you don’t mind the cold (not as Mongolia!). In Beijing spring is short dry and dusty. From April and May, a phenomenon called “yellow wind” (fine dust particles, blown all the way from Gobi desert) makes the visits of the capital less interesting. In summer the average temperature is 26 C with humidity and sometimes heavy thunderstorms.

Mongolian and Russian embassies in Beijing