News

A new rail service has been unveiled that will provide visitors to Beijing with quicker and easier access to the Great Wall of China.

The so-called Great Wall Express will cut in half the time it takes to reach Badaling, the 10km stretch of the wall that is open to tourists, so visitors will be able to travel to the site from Beijing in one hour.

Workers reportedly took just four months to renovate an existing railway line and improve stations along the route in order to have the project finished in time for the Olympics, Reuters reports.

Zhou Zhengyu, vice head of the Beijing municipal committee of communication, told reporters on the train: 'You look at Europe, for example Switzerland, they have their own famous sightseeing trains.

'We want to make this into Beijing's own tourist train.'

The new train service is expected to prove popular with visitors partly because it enables them to avoid the traffic jams that regularly build up on the return to Beijing from the Great Wall.

Stretching some 6,400km across the country, the Great Wall of China is one of the world's most famous tourist attractions and receives around 10m visitors every year.

Opodo cheap flights, hotels and car hire - let the journey begin!