My girlfriends planned the best trip for this weekend. Saturday morning they were going to board a train with brunch in hand and in 3 short(ish) hours they’d arrive in Kaifeng in Henan where we’d spend the weekend without the kids at the gorgeous Pullman Kaifeng Resort & Hotel sipping on Champagne and enjoying street food at the epic night market. But Covid travel restrictions tend to throw a monkey wrench in even the most well laid-out plans…
Last Saturday, Beijing officials said that with the upcoming long holiday over the weekend and the number of people returning to Beijing expected to increase, the city would be implementing stricter Covid prevention and control measures. They are strongly encouraging Beijingers to stay here this weekend instead of traveling outside of Beijing.
While they didn’t specifically say that traveling outside of Beijing is prohibited, you might be faced with a tougher time returning to make it back in time for work once your long weekend comes to an end.
For instance, yesterday (Sep 6) afternoon, my girlfriends received a notification that their return tickets from Kaifeng to Beijing on Monday Sep 12 had been canceled. The explanation given was simply that they were not allowed to return to Beijing from a different province (in this case Henan). They tried to purchase return tickets for a different day, but all came up with the same notification that train tickets back to Beijing were not allowed.
The kicker? While the return tickets were fully refunded, the departure tickets from Beijing were subjected to a 5% cancellation fee when my friends had to manually cancel them.
But luckily, Beijing’s full of lots of fun events this weekend, and some free ones like The Belt & Road Food Fest at Langyuan Station where 400+ tasty dishes from all around the world will all be in one place along with live entertainment and expected beautiful weather. 
Images: Shu Qi, Pexels
