Basics - The Rough Guide to Beijing - page 41

unless you're willing to pay an extortionate motor-rickshaw fare (and risk being ripped off),
you could be in for a fair wait.
Bicycles
Renting or buying a bike gives you much more independence and flexibility - and they're
often faster than taxis. There are bike lanes on all main roads and you'll be in the company
of plenty of other cyclists. If you feel nervous at busy junctions, just dismount and walk the
bike across - plenty of Chinese do.
Renting a bike
Almost all hotels - certainly all the hostels - rent out bikes for ￥ 10-30 a day, plus a
￥ 200-400 deposit. Upmarket hotels charge ￥ 50 a day for the same bikes. You can also rent
from many places in the hutongs around Houhai. Always test the brakes on a rented bike be-
fore riding off, and get the tyres pumped up. Should you have a problem, you can turn to one
of the bike repair stalls - there are plenty of these on the pavements next to main roads.
The city has recently been laying out ranks of decent (for now, at least) rental bikes . The
scheme was still in its infancy at the time of writing, and only local residents were able to
make use of it, but it's planned to roll this out to foreign tourists in due course. Assuming
that prices are the same as for locals, bikes will be free for the first hour, then ￥ 1 per hour
thereon to a maximum of ￥ 10 per day, using a transport card , after first throwing down a
￥ 400 deposit at a subway station.
Buying a bike
You can buy cheap city bikes from shops around town. Used models cost from around ￥ 200,
though you'll likely pay at least ￥ 350 for a bottom-of-the-range new one; for something re-
liable, try Carrefour or the strip of bike shops on the south side of Jiaodaokou, just west of
the Ghost Street (Gui Jie) restaurants. You'll need a good lock, as theft is very common.
City tours
Organizedtours of the city and its outskirts offer a painless, if expensive, way of seeing the
main sights quickly. All big hotels offer them, and CITS has a variety of one- and two-day
tour packages bookable from their offices, or from the information desk in the Friendship
Store. These tours aren't cheap, though the price includes lunch and pays for a tour guide: a
trip to the Summer Palace, Yonghe Gong and a pedicab jaunt around the hutongs is ￥ 360.
The one-day tours offered by the cheaper hotels offer better value than similar jaunts run
by classier places, and you don't have to be staying with them to go along; figure on around
￥ 120 for a typical tour. All the youth hostels offer good-value evening trips to the acrobat-
ics shows and the opera a few times a week (essentially the same price as the event ticket,
with transport thrown in), and trips (occasionally overnighters) to the Great Wall . You must
book these at least a day in advance.