August 12, 2007
Beijing is a wonderful and exciting city to visit. There are a lot of tourists and many important sights to visit. One afternoon, we drove out to see The Summer Palace, Yihe Yuan, dating to the 12th Century. It was designed to achieve harmony with nature and named “The Nourishing Peace Garden.”
The 700 acre grounds are picture-perfect and include the large man-made Kunming Lake and surrounding gardens. During the hot Beijing summers, the imperial family preferred the beautiful gardens, airy pavilions, and cooling lake of the Summer Palace to the Forbidden City.
The “Marble Ship” – Shifang – is a decorative building that looks like a real boat. It was originally built in 1755 and is the only Western-style structure in the park. The boat was restored by Empress Dowager Cixi in 1893.
The Seventeen-Arch Bridge was built in 1750. Over 500 stone lion statues were carve on the posts of the bridge’s railings.
Many local people asked us to take pictures with them and encouraged us to take photos of them.
There are several buildings to visit as well as long paths along the lake. I didn’t climb up Longevity Hill to see the Buddhist Temple which overlooks the entire park.
Below is a photo at night of the Monument to the People’s Heroes located in in the center of Tiananmen Square, in front of Mao Zedong’s Mausoleum. The 10-story obelisk was erected as “a monument to the martyrs of the revolutionary struggle during the 19th and 20th centuries.”
The highlight of any visit to China is seeing and climbing on The Great Wall. The huge fortification system of “walls” and towers were built along the northern border of historical China. The earliest parts date from the 7th century BC, however the first emperor of China, Qin She Huang, connected sections and expanded the Great Wall about 220BC.
The wall measures a total of 5,500 miles and several sections are open to tourists near Beijing. There were amazing views of the surrounding mountains.
What a thrill to be walking (actually climbing up many steep steps!) on the Great Wall of China!! We were driven to the Badaling part of the wall which dates from the 16th century. This was the first section to open to Western tourists in 1950.
The Great Wall is the largest man-made construction in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage site.
An enterprising craftsman carved stamps made out of stone at the entrance to The Wall.
Afterwards, we visited the Ming Tombs which is the place where 13 of the Ming Dynasty emperors were buried. Below is a picture of the Shengong Shengde Stele Pavilion at the beginning of the sacred walk leading to the tombs.
We also visited a workshop where the craftspeople were making Closeonee products for tourists. The ancient metalwork technique uses colorful glass enamels to create beautiful vases and other utensils.
Beijing was overflowing with construction projects for the 2008 Summer Olympics, next year. A huge number of apartment buildings and other large structures were being built as the Olympic Village. The building in the photo below is the “Bird’s Nest” stadium, officially known as the National Stadium.
I had a wonderful time in Beijing! It is an amazing city with many historic and modern sights to see and experience.