5/20 Viktor Allen

First stop was the Forbidden City, with our tour guide Ally walking us through the complex. For nearly 500 years this was the imperial palace of China, home to 24 emperors across the Ming and Qing dynasties, and completely off limits to ordinary people. The scale of it does not register until you are actually inside. You move through it in a kind of progression, one courtyard opening into the next, each hall built for a different ceremonial purpose. The yellow glazed roof tiles and red walls carry through the entire complex, and no matter how far in you get it never starts to feel small.

One of the highlights was walking through the Imperial Garden toward the back of the complex. It was a nice change of pace from the open courtyards, a lot more tucked away with old trees, decorative rockery, and pavilions scattered throughout. After spending hours walking through massive open spaces it felt like a completely different side of the place. We spent a few hours total just exploring, and at some point stopped to grab mango popsicles since it was pretty hot out. We had originally planned to visit Tiananmen Square before, but Putin was in Beijing that day for a state visit so the whole area was shut down, which was not something I expected to hear.

After the Forbidden City we had a family style lunch with the whole group, sharing a bunch of different dishes. Every time one plate got close to empty another one showed up. The food was genuinely great and easily one of the better meals of the trip so far.

The whole place reads like a really beautiful park at first glance but the more you walk around the more history starts to layer on top of it. We ended the visit with a boat ride back across the lake, which gave us a completely different view of the whole complex and was a solid way to close out the afternoon.

We took a taxi back to the hotel and from there a group of us found a basketball court nearby. We ran a few games of 3v3 and everyone was playing pretty well. Grabbed dinner close by after and called it a night.