Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
are places such as Beijing Fairmont Residence, which are serviced apartments situated
on Guangshun Beidajie, a very central point of the Wangjing area and right by Wangjing
subway station. Olive and Do Hu Wan apartments are more affordable at around
RMB4,000-17,000, and both have pleasant gardens to give you a sense of the outdoors.
Somewhere in between are Central Palace, Fangheng International Center, and Baoxing
Huating.
A real luxury of living around the Olympic area and Yayuncun (meaning Asian Village,
from the 1990 Asian Games) is your proximity to the Olympic facilities. The general
area around the Bird's Nest (National Stadium) isn't especially beautiful, perhaps even
bleak, but there are acres of cement for skateboarding and rollerblading. In winter you can
come here to ice skate on the manmade rink. There is also the National Aquatics Center,
better known as Water Cube (
www.water-cube.com
)
. It's one of the few Olympic ven-
ues open to the public. Visit for RMB30, swim for RMB50, or play in the water park
for RMB200 (
www.waterpark-watercube.com
). There is also the National Tennis Center
(
www.chinatenniscenter.com
)
. In addition to hosting the China Open, it has 17 outdoor and
indoor courts that are open for public use from 7am to 11pm, at a price. North of the stadi-
um, you have access to the Olympic Forest Park, a beautiful reforested area that has been
developed with the goals of cleaning the city's air, regenerating native foliage, and attract-
ing native birds. There are extensive running and walking tracks, which weave among man-
icured gardens and lakes.
On a map it may look inconvenient to live in this sector of the city, but for many people it
can actually be extremely convenient. If your life exists anywhere between Zhongguancun
in Haidian and Lido or Wangjing in the east you can get to and from each relatively swiftly
from here. The roads are good and less congested than the inner-city roads. You can get to
the airport in 25 minutes, and to either Zhongguancun or Wangjing in about 10 minutes. If
you need to get into town, Line 5 and Line 8 are your rapid modes of transport. Universit-
ies such as BCLU or Tsinghua are just a short bus or bicycle ride away, and once the final
section of Line 15 opens in 2014 they'll seem even closer. One drawback is that very few
Western-style bars, cafés, or restaurants are immediately at your doorstep; however, public
transport to get you to some is readily available.
Housing
Another advantage to living in this area is that affordable accommodations are plentiful
and varied. At the upper end of the market there is Chateau Glory, with its ornate and op-
