Beijing Natural History Museum

Lonely Planet review

The main entrance to this overblown, creeper-laden museum is hung with portraits of the great natural historians, including Darwin and Linnaeus (here spelt Linnacus). Escort kiddies to the revamped dinosaur hall facing you as you enter, which presents itself with an overarching skeleton of a mamenchisaurus jingyanensis - a vast sauropod that once roamed China - and a much smaller protoceratops .

Creepy crawlies are consigned to the second floor, there's an aquarium with Nemo-esque clown fish and an exhibition on the origins of life on earth, but the lack of English captions is baffling. Some of the exhibits, such as the spliced human cadavers and genitalia in the notorious Hall of Human Bodies are best reserved for those with strong constitutions, while visiting with munchkins could subject them to months of vivid nightmares and nocturnal disturbances. Visiting exhibitions are occasionally staged, again without English explanations. Some halls were being revamped at the time of writing.