Běidàihé Getting there & around

Getting there & away

Getting to Běidàihé or Shānhǎiguān is best done via Qínhuángdǎo, the largest city in the area. There are four express trains from Běijīng to Qínhuángdǎo (soft seat Y75, three hours), leaving at 7.30am, 8.30am, 2pm and 7.47pm. The earliest stops at Běidàihé (2½ hours); the 2pm stops at Shānhǎiguān (3½ hours). From Qínhuángdǎo, you can catch bus 33 to Shānhǎiguān (Y2, 30 minutes) or bus 34 to Běidàihé (Y2, 30 minutes) from in front of the train station on Yingbin Lu. There are plenty of other trains that pass through one of the three stations, though these can take up to six hours and may arrive at an inconvenient time.

There are express trains from Qínhuángdǎo back to Běijīng at 7.14am, 8.47am, 1.37pm and 4.19pm. It can be difficult to get tickets to Běijīng from the other two stations. Other destinations from Qínhuángdǎo include Tiānjīn (Y44, 3½ hours), Shíjiāzhuāng (Y160, 8½ hours), Shěnyáng (Y63 hard seat, five hours) and Hāěrbīn (Y230, 12 hours).

Comfortable buses leave for Běijīng’s Bawangfen Station from Qínhuángdǎo (Y62 to Y66, 3½ hours) between 7am and 7pm. There are also direct buses from Qínhuángdǎo to Chéngdé (Y61, 5½ hours), departing hourly from 7am to 11am, and at 5pm. A convenient place to pick up a bus to Běijīng in Běidàihé is from the east side of Haining Lu, just north of the post office (Y66, three hours, departures at 6am, 12.30pm and 4pm).

Near Shānhǎiguān, Qínhuángdǎo’s little airport has flights from Dàlián, Shànghǎi, Tàiyuán, Hāěrbīn and Chángchūn.