When I was in Beijing 4 years ago, QianMen, the street that runs north and south just below Tiananmen Square was a lively shopping district. It was rather seedy, but had a lot of shops including a very nice yarn store.
The street was gentrified for the Olympics and is now very pretting and clean, but the only shops that are open are the Famous Duck Restaurant, another restaurant, the post office and the public toilets. The buildings have been redone in the classic Beijing style of grey brick and red and gold trim.
The duck restaurant always had a line.
We always planned to walk down this street and continue to the Natural History Museum. Chuck kept asking me if I was sure we were going the right way. It was nice to see the triceratops to confirm that we had done it correctly.
The museum had a nice blend of bones:
And reconstrution. The first dino nest was found in China.
There always seems to be a play area in the places that will appeal to children. This kid didn't seem really happy to be riding the dino.
I did a movie of him too. (I was almost willing to pay for some kid to ride this thing, but this child happened first.This little girl was doing a sand painting:
Several kids were fishing:
And this was whack the moles:
This little boy was giving a tour of the dino exhibit. When he was finished, his dad took him aside and they talked about what he had done.
Besides the dino section, there were several floors of other Natural History museum stuff. The different here is that people get into the dioramas and pose with the animals. There is only a little rope fence between people and exhibit, so children are lifted in and encouraged to touch, kiss, ride the stuffed animals, etc.
We took a cab back and then went to Yan for dinner.We started with fried mushrooms. (Much like onion rings!)
beef in dry pan
an assortment of grilled fish:
And green stuffed balls that tasted a lot like the sesame balls that we get at dim sum.
We were very pleased with another day in Beijing
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