The Confederation of British Industry’s Chief Representative in Beijing is raising money for a key SQR project, the Guangji Kindergarten & Community Centre.
Many Beijing residents will have travelled along some part of the Jingcheng (Beijing to Chengde) highway enroute perhaps to the Great Wall at either Mutianyu or Jinshanling.
Guy Dru Drury, the CBI's Chief Representative in Beijing, prepares to take on the gruelling 500km 2009 JCCR
However, have you ever considered continuing along its entirety, past Beijing’s principal reservoir at Miyun and on into the mountains that lead, after 200 KM, to the imperial resort of Chengde? Well, if you do then you’ll be visiting the summer hideaway of successive Chinese Emperors who created their very own “summer palace” nestled in the mountains that overlook the Mongolian steppes. It is home to China’s largest palace garden and, incidentally, the world’s shortest river, the Rehe. At a mere 9 miles in length it feeds the bucolic Rehe springs and is largely contained within the vast expanse of the royal palace grounds. In August, and tentatively scheduled to coincide with the one year anniversary of the Olympic opening ceremony, the CBI’s Chief Representative, Guy Dru Drury, will be embarking on his own journey from Beijing to Chengde following the route of the Jingcheng highway. Travelling by a mixture of road and mountain bike he aims to cover the mountainous 500km roundtrip route in 20 hours over the weekend of the 8 August.
It is all in the name of a good cause, namely raising money for the reconstruction of the Guangji Kindergarten destroyed in last year’s devastating earthquake.
Downloadable information
If you would like to support Guy’s efforts then please give generously to SQR directly. By the way, if you do want to visit Chengde you can of course travel there in air‐conditioned comfort either by car or rail if a 20 hour cycle ride is not your preferred means of transport!
Guy Dru Drury (guydd@cbi.org.uk and gdrudrury@gmail.com)
Beijing 01.07.09
