City-hopper special #4 - Qingdao, Shandong province

Week two, city four, and I was back on the east coast of China. Roughly halfway between Beijing to the north and Shanghai to the south, I was the furthest north I’ve been so far and in potentially my favourite city yet.

This is a bit of a bumper episode as I tagged two extra leisure days on to one day of working, and Ash came to join me - purely for science - so I could properly review the beer festival. So strap yourself in - you're about to embark on a rollercoaster journey full of beautiful scenery and crimes against beer…

Qingdao is a harbour city on the coast of the Yellow Sea, at the foot of the LaoShan mountain, and is home to the world’s second longest sea bridge – the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge – and the second largest Brewery in China, The Tsingtao Brewery which was founded in 1903 (pronunciation is the same as the city). It’s got a colourful history as an important port, having been occupied by the Germans for 16 years and the Japanese, and this adds to its unique culture.

Ash and I really packed in as much of Qingdao as possible in the day-and-a-half we had, so here’s a rundown of what we got up to:

Qingdao Olympic sailing centre

Right on the edge of our hotel for the first night was a beautiful harbour where the sailing competitions were held during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, with the Olympic Rings proudly on view. With bars and restaurants along the water’s edge, we mooched about for a couple of hours in the heat towards a little lighthouse, and looking across the sea. We paid 20RMB per person to get the little train back along to the Olympic Torch, which you walk towards through what feels like hundreds of colourful flags. We thought getting a beer from a little stall to walk around with would be an appropriate thing to do – it was hot, we are British, and we’re in the home of Tsingtao beer – but it turned out to be a big mistake. This is where the city’s first crime against beer was committed. Despite there being a pump and me pointing at it when I asked for ‘2 bei pijiu’, the woman turned around to the fridge behind her, pulled out a jug, and promptly delivered us two sad, flat pints. I didn’t need Ash’s mature alcohol palate there to tell me it was horrible, and both beers went in the bin. Sad.

Once we’d checked in to our hostel (Kaiyue International Hostel, would recommend for people looking for something that’s simple, good value and in a good location), we went forth to…

Tsingtao Beer Museum

Located in the heart of Beer Street is the Tsingtao Beer Museum, on the site of the old brewery. For 60RMB (£7) you get entry into the two-part museum, plus two free drinks and a packet of honey roast peanuts. The museum was constructed in 1903 by the Germans who were longing for beer, and is one of the few typical Gothic constructions in Qingdao. The museum gives you an insight into the history of the company and the brewing practices, lets you stand amongst the old equipment and previous styles of bottles and cans, and, obviously, marvel at the work of the Chinese government to get the sales of Tsingtao beer to number one in the world.

It’s interactiveish – you can pay for a tour guide – but all the writing is in English as well as Mandarin, so you can happily potter about and spend time at the areas of most interest to you. At the end there is a bar (a wonderful replica of all those big beer halls you find in Winter Wonderland or Oktoberfest) and a gift shop, complete with a ‘drunken house’ which does some sciency things to make you feel like you’ve had three too many and are now at the stage where closing your eyes makes you want to throw up. So that was a nice experience. You then walk through to an area that resembles a British pub - or the closest thing I’ve found yet - where you get your free peanuts and beer. This is where crime #2 against beer was committed. The person pouring the pints was aggressively throwing the glass around as the beer was poured, creating a half-beer-half-head monstrosity, and knocking the bubbles out of the drink. Ash and I couldn’t believe our eyes. Despite that, it did feel nice to be leaning against a small ledge, surrounded by people chatting loudly and drinking beer, instead of the usual game in ‘bars’ of trying to explain that no, we don’t want food, only beer.

Does. Not. Compute.

Which takes us to…

Beer Street

It’s easy to get lured into the ways of European drinking culture around these parts, but very quickly do you get brought back to China with a bump. The beer hall at the end of the beer museum was, inexplicably, not serving beer (what?) so we were turfed out onto Beer Street to find an alternative. Beer Street looks a bit like ‘the strip’. Garish flashing neon lights, enormous signs of cartoon women in German dirndls carrying steins, people waving menus in your face as you go past. But don’t get too comfortable, whilst the activities are the same as the bars you’d see in Brits abroad favourites, these are not pubs or bars as you know it. These are ‘come to Beer Street and we’ll force all of Qingdao’s local seafood and flat Tsingtao beer at you whether you like it or not’ places. We found one that looked the most like a bar (I think it was even called ‘beer bar’) and the woman sat us down and thrust an enormous seafood menu in our faces. She couldn’t quite understand that we only wanted beer, and when we did get the beer, it arrived in a jug, a little flat, and a little warm. Mmm... But there were buskers playing nearby and the weather was nice, so we enjoyed a little rest. Until we decided to turn it up a notch and go to…

Qingdao International Beer Festival

Or ‘Asia’s Oktoberfest’ as it likes to call itself. Held annually in July and August, at Golden Sands Beach, international beer companies head to the shores of Shandong for this epic festival. We headed there with absolutely no expectations, and we couldn’t believe how absolutely gargantuan it was when we arrived – the first road down towards the main area was lined with huge floats, flashing lights, and what felt like hundreds of little European style drinking houses. We were home! Then it became less beer-village and more music festival, with fireworks, strobe lights, spotlights, funfair rides, and loud music blaring through the night. Towards the end you get to the big tents seating thousands of people, sponsored by brands like Tsingtao, Heinkenen, Carlsberg, Russell Brewing Co and more, all blaring out music with live entertainment on stage. We got drawn towards the foam machine and the picture of the Little Mermaid drinking a pint outside the Carlsberg tent, so started in there. Not many (or any) people spoke much English, so we got to test our Chinese beer vocabulary to try and buy some drinks. We ordered two steins but soon realized that steins aren’t drinks to be drunk from, oh no, they were just fancy looking jugs. So eventually one jug, one stein arrived along with two plastic cups. Sure. The Carlsberg was definitely weaker than we are used to, either because they watered it down for the festival, or because it’s brewed differently in China (the beer tends to be weaker here). So that, plus the group sat in front of us tucking into an enormous seafood platter, then the pause in entertainment in every single tent for an auction of wall hangings to take place, brought us back to China, once again, with a bump. Later on when we moved to another tent, we witnessed yet another crime against beer, in this city famous for beer: warm bottles of beer. You really do have to go with the flow here, lower your expectations, and just roll with the punches. It was a great experience, some of the entertainment was mind boggling, but the experience overall is really second to none. I wouldn’t come here over Oktoberfest if I had the choice, but if you’re in the area, it’s definitely worth a visit and would be a lot of fun with a group of friends.

After getting to bed about 1am, the next day was a lie-in, sightseeing, alcohol-free kinda day, and we started off at…

Zhongshan Park

Before you get any ideas in your mind of what Zhongshan Park is like, remember that we are in China and big green areas on maps don’t mean big green areas in real life. Chinese parks are luscious leafy spaces with big wide paths, but there’s no sitting down to picnic. They’re actually quite tiring places to be in the heat! But Zhongshan Park is the biggest (spanning 75 hectares) and oldest (built in 1901) park in Qingdao, with the Qingdao TV Tower, cable car and zoo to the north, numerous botanical gardens and lakes and more than 100,000 plants. It was a really, really lovely area to walk around, and free to enter, with the TV Tower standing impressively overhead. We decided to head towards it, but for some reason decided to walk up a billion steps in the 30 degree heat rather than take the cable car… regrets.

Qingdao TV and radio tower

When you eventually get to the top of TaiPing Hill, for 100RMB per person (around £12) you can go to the observation deck, 116m up the 232m tall Qingdao TV tower, giving you 360 degree views of the city, over the beer museum (ah, memories), LaoShan Mountain, Zhongshan park, the cableway and the coast where the Yellow Sea meets Qingdao city. The observation deck was quiet when we visited, despite being a Saturday afternoon, which meant we got to spend time engaging with the little games they have up there (which seem to have nothing to do with Qingdao nor the TV tower) and looking at the views. Each new position offered different views. Some showed a city scene, with skyscrapers and buildings as far as the eye can see. Some showed a lush, green, mountainous scene, and others showed the beaches and waterfront activities. It was awesome. On the way down we were deposited at the café on the floor below, where we could bask in the air conditioning and have coffee, smoothies and cakes. The colonial design with big comfy sofas and lamps you’d find in your grandma’s house should have looked out of place, but it worked and we had to be careful not to catnap for too long and make the place look untidy. Would recommend the mango smoothies any day of the week.

After an hour or so we descended to look around the rest of the tower, which has TV cameras and broadcast equipment on display, before heading to our next destination…

Qingdao ropeway

Whilst we may have decided the 70RMB (£8) fee was too much to pay for a lift up TaiPing Hill (should be called a mountain), having been able to see it going from the top of the TV tower meant that we were keen to give it a go. We took it in a different direction, towards the botanical gardens end of Zhongshan Park and got to see the city from a different angle. Starting off amongst the trees, you smoothly climb up above the leaves to see the skyscrapers on the edge of the city with the boats on the sea behind it. It was warm with a lovely breeze, and every now and again you’d get a curious Chinese person waving at you as they went past in the other direction. Whilst we only went one direction, you can pay 120RMB for a return ticket, as there are three potential stops to explore.

From there, we walked through the park, exploring the botanical gardens, and eventually we got a Didi (Chinese Uber) back across the city to:

Zhanqiao pier and the German old town

The pier was way too busy for us to walk down, for fear of getting a sun umbrella spoke in the eye, but it was nice to look at from afar, sticking 440m out into the sea with a temple at the end. It’s allegedly where the Germans disembarked to attack Qingdao, and is the recommended first stop to walk around the old town, with the German-style buildings and the cathedral. We fought our way past the millions of tourists up Zhongshan road, and after about ten minutes came to St Michael’s Cathedral, standing proudly in the centre of a cobbled square. This was definitely not Chinese style construction and after watching the brides and grooms have their photos taken in front of the building, we paid the 10RMB entry fee to take a look around. It didn’t have the same prowess as churches/cathedrals I’ve been to in Europe, but was still interesting to look around, with its statues of religious stories and stained glass windows. The cathedral was built in 1934, with the two towers standing at 56m high, each with a 4.5m tall cross atop. After sitting in the square and soaking in the relatively familiar feeling of being back in Europe, we went back to the hostel a small nap, and headed to…

Fatima Indian restaurant

This deserves its own paragraph as it gave two Brits, starved of good quality Indian food, a real joyful culinary experience that they cannot get in Chongqing. After not having eaten much and walked 6 miles during the day, this restaurant came recommended by a friend of a friend, and we do not need to be told twice to try a curry. The waitress laughed at us ordering two curries, a daal, some samosas, a rice and a naan, telling us that we would probably need to take some home with us, but we just laughed back and showed her what we’re made of. It was absolutely delicious, even if the lamb in the lamb rogan josh was a little fatty, and we took our very happy tummies back to the pier where it all began, to see May Fourth Square, walk off the food and enjoy the music from the outdoor ‘White Rave’ festival, which was sending dance remixes of well-known pop songs across Qingdao.

May Fourth Square

This area of Qingdao got its name in memory of the May 4th movement, which was sparked by Article 156 of the Treaty of Versailles, transferring German concessions in Shandong to Japan (rather than returning sovereign authority to the Chinese). This sparked outrage and ignited mass student demonstrations in Beijing on May 4th 1919, and these influenced the Chinese delegation to not sign the Treaty. It’s nice to come here and learn about the history, but it is a quick pitstop on a much longer walk around the seafront.

Phew! I think I need a holiday from that holiday. Whilst it was a little more expensive than life in Chongqing, the fresh air, international feel and different activities on offer meant that we had a really lovely time and will probably be back in the future, to try out the beaches we never got to try this time! Maybe we’ll drag some friends back next year and do the beer festival properly.

Any takers?