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How to Visit Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival

Tuesday, January 1st, 2013

Plan your Beijing winter tour? Don’t miss an excursion to Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival. The year 2013 is the 27th Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival. This famous ice and snow fetival boasts the three intriguing items – Ice Lanterns, Ice Carving and Snow Sculptures. If you are not going to have a Harbin tour for an amazing ice and snow festival in Harbin, Beijing Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival is a perfect substitute.

The venue for Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival is the narrow valley in the Longqing Gorge Sceni Area. The Longqing Gorge Sceni Area is 15km in the northeast of Yanqing County, about 80km from Beijing city center. The Longqing Gorge is a famous summer resort, a 7-km long ravine passed by the Gucheng River, which is dubbed as “Little Li River”, or “Little Three Gorges of Yangtze River”. But if you come here in winter, you can see ice lnaterns, ice and snow scultures during the ice festival period.

This year’s ice lantern festival will last from January 10 to the end of February with four sections – Colorful Lantens, Ice Carving, Snow Sculptures and the “Longqing Gorge Cup” International Ice and Snow Carving Competition. You will 350 ice lanterns, 250 ice carvings, over 60 snow sculptures, over 200 groups of colorful lantern, 300 tree lanterns. In addition, there are a group of city lanterns of several ten hundreds meters long and several ten thousand decorative lanterns represented by Ruins of St. Paul in Macao, Hong Kong Disneyland, Nanshan Temple in Hainan Island, City Hall of Sansha City, the Sea Goddess Mazu and 101 Tower in Taipei and more classical elements.

You can also visit the ice lantern festival in the daytime. Of course, the best time to view the ice lanterns is in the evening lasting from 5;00pm to 10:00pm.

The venue for Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival is adjacent to several winter attractions such as Badaling Great Wall, Shijinglong Ski Resort and Badaling Ski Resort. You can combine two or three sights in a one-day Beijing excursion.

Venue: Longqing Gorge Scenic Area in the norrth of Gucun Village, Jiuxian Town, Yanqing County, Beijing 延庆县旧县镇古城村北龙庆峡景区
Festival Time: Jan 10 – Feb

Opening Hours: 17:00 – 22:00 ( it can also be visited in the daytime)

Entry Tickets: RMB 100; RMB 50 (students); Free for travelers under 12 years

Enquiry: 69191020

How to get there

Bus: take Bus 919 from Deshengmen Bus Terminal and get off at Yanqing County and change for Bus 920 for Longqing Gorge
S Train: take S train to Yanqing County

Self-drive: Drive along Badaling Expressway (Jingzang Expressway) and eixt from Exit 62, pass by Yanqing County, drive along National Highway 110 and follow the sign to Longqing Gorge.

Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern Festival Night Tour From US$65 per person

Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern & Badaling Great Wall Day Trip from US$60

Longqing Gorge Ice Lantern & Shijinglong Ski Resort Day Trip from US$70

Colourful Lantern – Dragon Boat

The colorful lanterns – Fish

The clourful Tree Lanterns

The lit colorful lanterns with the backdrop of the lit Grea Wall

The radiant ice lanterns

The lit ice carvings

The colourful Ice Carvings

Have a close look at the ice sculptures

A panoramic view of the ice city of carvings

Any questions, just drop a line.

Tags: Beijing ice, Beijing Ice and Snow Festival, Beijing Ice Carving, Beijing Ice Sculptures, Beijing snow, Beijing Snow Sculptures
Posted in Beijing Attractions, Beijing Excursions, Beijing Self-Service Tour, Beijing Travel, Beijing Winter Tour | 14 Comments »

Beijing Aerial Tour

Friday, December 28th, 2012

Plan your Beijing tour? Visiting the Great Wall of China is a must during your first trip to Beijing. Now you can either take a walk on the Great Wall or take a helicopter to view the Great Wall from the air. Beijing aerial tour of flyong over the Great Wall is an exhilarating experience that will last for a life-long memory.

At present, the Capital Helicopter is the only aerial tour operator in Beijing, which affiliated to Hainan Airlines. Hainan Airlines (HNA) is one of the four largest airlines in China and the other three are Air China, China Southern Airlines and China Eastrern Airlines.

The Capital Helicopter utilises the helicopters from Eurocopter inclduing AS350 B3 Squirrel and ES 135. The Eurocopter’s helicopters are reputed for it safety and comfort. For aerial tourism, the Capital Helicopter runs two regular flights – 15 minutes and 30 minutes. They also offer custom helicopter charters to fly your own flight route with the assistance of the flight routes designers from the Capital Helicopter.

The 15-minute flight brings you to see the Badaling Great Wall from the sky and other scenic spots like Guanting Reservoir and Kangxi Grassland in Yanqing County. The helicopter takes off from Badaling Airport and back to the Badaling Airport.

For the 30-minute flight, you are required to take a helicopter from the Capital Helicopter’s helipad at Jianyi Mansion near the fourth ring road. The 30-minute flight makes you enjoy the magnificent Bird’s Net (Olympic Games), Juyongguan Great Wall and Badaling Great Wall, a 120km long flight travel route.

Beijing Helicopter Tour is one of the most exciting choice to see the Grat Wall.

Beijing Capital Helicopter

Agent Hotline: 0086 – 10-67160201 ext 1006

Add:12F, Grand China Airlines Palaza, B-2East 3rd ing, North and Road, Chaoyang District, Zhengzhou.

Follow me to visit Badaling Airport and the Eurocopter’s Helicopters. From downtown Beijing, drive along the JingZang Expressway (Beijing – Tibet) G6, passing by Juyongguan Great Wall and Badaling Great Wall and exit from Exit 62.

Exit from the Exit 62 and enter Yanqing County.

Exit from the Exit 62 and enter Yanqing County

Soon, on your left side you will see the entrance to Badaling Airport.

The entrance to Badaling Airport

The main airport terminal building of Badaling Airport.

The main airport terminal building of Badaling Capital Helicopter

A helicopter is about to take off

The helicopter is about to take off

A helicopter is off the ground

The helicopter is taking off the ground

One helicopter is flying and the other is waiting for the instruction.

Flying over Badaling Great Wall and the mountains

See the undulating Great Wall of China

Any questions, just drop a line.

15 Minutes Aerial Tour and Great Wall Walking Tour from US$260 p/p30 Minutes Aerial Tour and Great Wall Walking Tour from US$1430 p/p

Tags: Badaling Aerial Tour, Badaling Great Wall Aerial Tour, Badaling Great Wall Helicopter Tour, Beijing Air Tour, Beijing Air Travel, Great Wall Helicopter Tour
Posted in Beijing Excursions, Beijing Tour Reviews, Beijing Travel, Beijing Winter Tour, Great Wall Tours Review | No Comments »

Beijing 2012 Late Autumn Leaves hit by Early Winter Snowfall

Sunday, November 4th, 2012

Today (Sunday) Beijing has been hit by the early winter snowfall and sleet after yesterday’s fog and rain caused by a cold front in northern China. It is quite rare in Beijing to be lashed with freezing rain and snowfall three days before the coming of Li Dong (Winter begins), the 19th solar term of the 24 solar terms according to Chinese lunar calendar.

Fortunately from last Thursday Beijing local residents have been bombarded by text messages, news online and TV weather forecasts by China’s National Meteorological Center which has issued an orange alert, predicting that heavy snow would hit in the northern provinces surrounding Beijing through Tuesday. To fight the strong cold, Beijing has turned on the city’s public heating starting from last Thursday 15 days ahead of the official November 15 start date.

At 8:00am I get up with a pleasant surprise at the snow flakes blanketing the roofs and gardens here and there in our residential area. Fascinated by the scene of “autumn leaves meeting early snowfall”, after simple breakfast, I put on an extra layer of clothes and leave my heated flat for the Ming Dynasty City Wall Relics Park, not far from my residential area.

Walk slowly on the street covered by the melted snowfall filled with rain water. Then Cross over a flyover where a snow clearing worker is clearing the snow from the flyover. The government said that it is well prepared to fight the unusual early snowfall. It is reported that there are 5,776 snow clearing devices on standby to clear the streets, and the city has prepared 22,000 tons of snow-melting agent.

This section of the city wall is the only remaining city wall relics built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) in Beijing. The remnant city wall is about 1.5km in length, which has been transformed into a public park.

The Arrow Tower in the eastern tip of the wall is hidden behind the atumn leaves with the early winter snow on the ground. The tower was first built 1436, the largest of its kind existent in China, now a key historical and cultural site under state protection.