Beijing's Gold-Medal Hotels
By Debbie Mason from Forbes Traveler

Book now, avoid Olympian challenge later

Three decades ago, the word "luxury" was a six-letter word that in China could land you in jail-or at best in the deep, dark countryside for a dose of "re-education" in a paddy field or wheat mill. Just 30 years after late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping kick-started economic reforms to save the flailing Communist giant, moneyed Beijingers whose grandparents would have been garbed in drab blue Mao suits now shop at Gucci and Chanel.

The one-storey shacks that so recently housed entire families are now either museum pieces or razed to the ground, having made way for gated villa complexes, glitzy western-style shopping malls and towering serviced apartments. So is this it? Is Beijing really up there with the best of the world's culture capitals?

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It's doing its best, and it'll currently doing just fine for the Olympics. Guy Rubin, managing partner of Imperial Tours, which was founded eight years ago to cater to top-end tourists in Beijing says "We have to have a bit of a reality check before we compare it to the other world cities." "I don't think the facilities are quite like you get in London, New York and Paris. That's over-stating it. But on the other hand, I think there's a lot more here than the average American or British traveler would expect."

It certainly seems there's no shortage of luxury options for those wanting to experience the Beijing Olympics in style.

Under guidelines set by the Beijing Tourism Bureau, which got 1.5 million tourists for the Games, five-star rooms should be in the region of A$380 per night, A$300 for four-star. Hotels are, in fact, so confident of filling their rooms, they're ignoring these pointers and charging up to 10 times that. In response, the Bureau says its responsibility stops at supervising quality, and it cannot – or will not – interfere with individual hotels' pricing policies. And despite the hikes, the rooms are going fast.

The 305-room, five-star Ritz-Carlton Beijing, the second in the city, opened just 5 months ago. "We were sold out for the Olympics a year before we opened," says director of communications Kaarin Lindsay. "And all the bookings are for a minimum of 14 nights." Many of the top-end hotels, such as the Hilton, the Regent Beijing and the Peninsula, a grand, marble-foyered hotel just off the most famous shopping street in the Chinese capital, Wangfujing, are telling similar stories.

But Beijing does have 120 top-grade hotels, according to the Tourism Bureau. Many of their rooms have been snapped up by tour companies, so if rooms are not available from the hotels themselves, most will still be in the sticky hands of the agents-but not for much longer.

The China World Hotel was the recent choice of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in his visit to Beijing. It offers everything a first-class traveler would want, with the advantage of a great location right on top of one of Beijing's most glitzy brand-name shopping malls, and a short ride from the embassy district with its accompanying restaurants and nightlife.

The quiet but central Spring Garden Courtyard offers luxury rooms positioned around a central courtyard, each styled according to a particular Chinese emperor or dynasty. English is not the best at this hotel, but sign language and smiles work wonders and when it comes to booking rooms. There are more than 100 photographs of historic Beijing on show, among many other typical Chinese artifacts. The hotel is a four-star option, but it can make the China experience seem much more authentic.

When it comes to choosing accommodation, distance to the Games venues was top priority. The Beijing Government controlled the traffic even banishing half of the car population from the roads during the Olympics. All venues should be within half an hour's drive from most hotels, even if you're staying at the Kempinski-run Commune by the Great Wall, which, as its name suggests, provides guests with a panoramic view of China's most famous monument (the property is about half and hour north of Beijing by expressway).

See our slideshow of Beijing's hottest hotels before, during and after the Olympic Games.

See our slideshow of Beijing's Gold-Medal Hotels.