A quick word of warning—if you’re traveling in Beijing, or China for that matter, I recommend printing out directions and maps of places you’ll be going in English and Chinese. This is particularly true if you’re going to rely on taxis to get around. Beijing is growing quickly and a lot of taxi drivers really don’t know the city that well. More than once I’ve gotten into a cab, explained were I wanted to go, showed them the address and map in Chinese, only for the driver to tell me that they have no idea where that is and recommend I find a new cab. I had this happen two times over this last weekend in Beijing. I had a similar experience in Guangzhou this summer too. I don’t know the cities well enough to give directions by landmarks, which seems to work better than addresses, but that can be another strategy. Call up your hotel and specifically ask them what you should tell a taxi or what large, notable buildings the hotel is near.
Oh, and for reference, if you’re paying more than 100 RMB to get from the airport into downtown Beijing, you’re paying way too much.
Also, hotel prices vary widely in China and aren’t always representative of the quality you’ll find. For example, this time I stayed in the Beijing Comfort Inn which ran a bit over 500 RMB a night. The inn has several floors in an office building with a Hyundai showroom on the ground level. But the room was great—large and clean. I had free internet and the front desk was very helpful. So while this hotel is unlikely to show up on many searches, or even get great reviews, it was perfect for my weekend stay.
Photo below is a scene from O’Reilly’s China Foo this last weekend
§Commentary
The funny thing is, they seem unable to read a map even when it’s in Chinese. Happened to me in Dalian as well, three years ago. Usually its better to give them a business card of a nearby hotel. They will always find that, maybe after calling someone on their mobile.
How to tell a good hotel from a bad one? In the bad one you get phone calls by call girls every night. Don’t know if that’s just a misinterpretation of the term, tough :-)
damn.. we should have met up .. I am in Beijing, and about to head out tonight.
I was staying next to tsinghua university. luckily I had a driver pick me up.
another hint. If you can be bothered, walk out of the hotel to order food. A typical room service meal for me cost about 50RMB, and the local restaurant (with better tasting food) was about 16, and usually has a picture menu so you can just point. even a bottle of coke from the minibar was 20.