It was my last few hours in Beijing so I decided to go for a jog around the streets of my hotel. I left at about 7am so I was expecting it to be really quiet but this was not the case as there were thousands of people already up and about going to work and seeing the sites. I ran to the forbidden city which was only a few ks away. It was all locked up and heavily secured by guards. I then headed to tiarmen square which is what I presumed the government offices. There were literally thousands of Asian tourists in this huge square getting guided tours from tour guides.
I then continued down wangfuijin st which is the street which runs down from my hotel. I did some measurements from station to station on my gps and it was about 1km between them. I called in and took a photo of an artificial turf soccer field which looked really good. I continued east along the road and was having enough of it so I headed north underneath the main highway and about 500m along I found a small park which had outdoor table tennis tables. I called In and had a game with two Chinese men I was beaten 3-0 in the first match and then 2-1 in my second match I was up 9-5 in the third set of my last game so I was pretty upset I could not get my first international table tennis victory. The old guys there loved that I came down for a hit and there were plenty of photos taken. I presume the men were retired and that it was there hobby. There would of been 6 tables there which were held up by a steel frame and a granite finish for the table which was quite a good idea for playing table tennis outdoors.
I left and then headed west along my hotels street and in about 10 minutes I was back. I covered about 12km in under an hour. I quite enjoy running around the cities. It would just be a bit nicer if the pollution was not so bad.