Day 84 12-5

And so this commences the last week of our stay here in Beijing! We thought that since it's our last week here and we don't have much time left to explore Beijing's wonders, we figure that we should fully utilise our time. So it starts today.

We started our day by going to the gym, which is our standard practice every Monday since the beginning of our trip to Beijing. Then off we went to Lama Yonghegong Temple. We heard of this place plenty of times from our friends who toured Beijing and indeed, it was a temple with plenty of history. It started construction in 1694 during the Qing dynasty. It was then converted into the residence of Yinzhen (Prince Yong), the fourth son of the Kangxi Emperor. After Prince Yong ascended the throne as the Yongzheng Emperor in 1722, half of the building was converted into a lamasery, a monastery for monks of Tibetan Buddhism. The other half remained an imperial palace.
Upon entering the temple, we were greeted with a  very nice entrance.

Once we entered, there were plenty of praying altars, be it in buildings, or small rooms. After every main building with an altar, there'll be another one after you go pass it. There are about 6 of them. Each and every altar has their different Gods.

It was quite interesting because the temple is so huge and full of culture. As China is mainly a Buddhist country, we think that it's a fulfilling experience visiting this temple.

Our next destination was HouHai. We heard about this place plenty of times too so we decided to check it out. HouHai is a place with a lot of food stalls and its buzzing atmosphere.

For dinner, we ate French food with our French friends. We ate raclette, a uunique way of eating cheese where the cheese is melted onto the bread and potatoes. However it was really expensive. But it's something that we wouldn't mind spending our money on especially after a tiring day out!