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North Cathedral
Also called the Cathedral of Our Saviour, this august cathedral is one of Běijīng's four main churches and the only one located within the grounds of the Imperial City. Built in 1887, the church was badly damaged during the Cultural Revolution before serving as a factory warehouse. Despite being covered in gaudy grey, flaking paint, the cathedral is well worth a look-see.
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Old Summer Palace
A melancholic tangle of broken columns and marble chunks, the original Summer Palace was laid out in the 12th century. The subdued ruins can be mulled over in the Eternal Spring Garden (Chángchūn Yuán), where you can find the Great Fountain Ruins, considered the best-preserved relic in the palace. West of the ruins is an artful reproduction of a former labyrinth called the Garden of Yellow Flowers.
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Paleozoological Museum Of China
A little bit cheesy, with an impressive tally of zero English captions, but young palaeontologists can scurry among the dinosaur remains and legions of Chinese schoolchildren, gawping at skeletons of Tyrannosaurus Rex and Tsingtaosaurus and examining the parrot-like beak of Psittacosaurus .
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Poly Art Museum
This excellent museum displays Shang and Zhou dynasty bronzes and carved stone Buddhist effigies sculpted between the Northern Wei and Tang dynasties. It's a sublime display but note the often unaccommodating opening hours for individuals.
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Prince Gong's Residence
Reputed to be the model for the mansion in Cao Xueqin's 18th-century classic, Dream of the Red Mansions , the residence is one of Běijīng's largest private residential compounds. This remains one of Běijīng's more attractive retreats, decorated with rockeries, plants, pools, pavilions, corridors and elaborately carved gateways.
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Red Gate Gallery
Beneath the giant wooden rafters of the ancient Dongbianmen Watchtower, in a room cooled by vast slate floors, hangs an array of avant-garde art. Established by an Australian art historian, Red Gate Gallery displays Beijing's most innovative and electric modern art.
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Ritan Park
Built in 1530, this lovely pine-filled park was where emperors came to make sacrifices to the sun. These days, the large ritual alter is used by kite flyers and taichi practitioners.
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Science & Technology Museum
Some exhibits at this museum are showing their age, but kids can run riot among the main hall's three floors of hands-on displays. Watch industrial robots perform a flawless Taichi sword routine, try chatting with the speech robot who only seems able to say '对不起，我没有听懂你的话' ('Sorry, I didn't catch you'), follow a maglev train gliding along a stretch of track or test out a bullet-proof vest with a sharp pointy thing.
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Song Qingling Former Residence
Madam Song is lovingly venerated by the Chinese as the wife of Sun Yat-sen, founder of the Republic of China. Her house is rather dormant and moth-eaten; on display are personal items, pictures, clothing and books. You can find the museum on the northern side of Houhai Lake and within reach of Prince Gong's Residence.
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Songtangzhai Museum
This small museum on Liulichang Dongjie has few English captions, but it's one of the few places you can get to see traditional Chinese carvings gathered together. Well worth popping into if wandering Liulichang. Seek out the gateway from Jiāngxī with its elaborate architraving, examine old drum stones, Buddhist effigies, ancient pillar bases and carved stone lions.
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South Cathedral
Běijīng's South Cathedral was built in 1703 on the site of the house of Matteo Ricci, the Jesuit missionary who introduced Catholicism to China. The church has been destroyed three times, including being burnt down in 1775, and endured a trashing by anti-Christian forces during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. The church is now decorated with modern stained glass, fake marbling, portraits of the Stations of the Cross and cream-coloured confessionals.
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Southeast Corner Watchtower
This splendid fortification, with a green-tiled, twin-eaved roof rising up imperiously south of the Ancient Observatory, dates back to the Ming dynasty. Clamber up the steps for views alongside camera-wielding Chinese trainspotters eagerly awaiting rolling stock grinding in and out of Beijing Train Station. The highly impressive interior has staggering carpentry: huge red pillars surge upwards, topped with solid beams.
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St Joseph's Church
A crowning edifice on Wangfujing Dajie and one of Běijīng's four principal churches, St Joseph's Church is also known locally as the East Cathedral. The church is a testament to the long history of Christianity in China. A large piazza in front swarms with children playing; white doves photogenically flutter about and Chinese models in bridal outfits wait for the sun to emerge before posing for magazine shots.
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Summer Palace
The huge regal encampment of the Summer Palace is one of the city's principle attractions. Once a playground for the imperial court eluding the insufferable summer swelter of the Forbidden City, today the palace grounds, its temples, gardens, pavilions, lakes and corridors teem with marauding tour groups.
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Temple of Heaven Park
The example of Ming architecture, Tiāntán - literally 'Altar of Heaven' - has come to symbolise Běijīng. The temple originally served as a vast stage for the solemn rites performed by the emperor, the Son of Heaven, as he sought good harvests, divine clearance and atonement for the sins of the people. Unique architectural features will delight numerologists, necromancers and the superstitious - not to mention acoustic engineers and carpenters.
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Tiananmen Square
The world's largest public square, Tiananmen Sq is a vast desert of paving stones at the heart of Běijīng. It may be a grandiose, Maoist tourist trap, but the view is breathtaking on a clear day and at nightfall. Kites flit through the sky, children stamp around and Chinese out-of-towners huddle together for the obligatory photo opportunity.
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Wan Fung Art Gallery
This Beijing branch of the Hong Kong-based gallery deals in contemporary Chinese figurative art in traditional mediums like oil or watercolour.
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Wanshou Temple & Beijing Art Museum
Ringed by a red wall, the Ming dynasty Wanshou Temple was originally consecrated for the storage of Buddhist texts. From Qing times the imperial entourage would put their feet up here and quaff tea en route to the Summer Palace. Wanshou Temple fell into disrepair during the Republic, with the Wanshou Hall burning down in 1937. Things went from bad to worse and during the Cultural Revolution the temple served as an army barracks.
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White Cloud Temple
White Cloud Temple, once the Taoist centre of northern China, was founded in AD 739. It's a lively, huge and fascinating temple complex of shrines and courtyards, tended by distinctive Taoist monks with their hair twisted into topknots. Today's temple halls date principally from the Ming and Qing dynasties.
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Workers Cultural Palace
On the Forbidden City's southeastern flank opposite Zhongshan Park and away from the frantic hubbub is the Workers Cultural Palace. Despite the unappealing name, this was the emperor's premier place of worship, the Supreme Temple (太庙; Tài Miào). If you find the Forbidden City either too colossal or crowded, the temple halls here are a cheaper and more tranquil alternative.
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Wuta Temple
The highly distinctive Indian-styled Wuta Temple (Five Pagoda Temple) is topped by its five magnificent namesake pagodas. The exterior of the main hall is decorated with a tangle of dorjes (Tibetan sceptres), hundreds of images of Buddha and legions of beasts, amid traces of red pigment that can still be discerned.
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Xu Beihong Museum
The Chinese artist Xu Beihong (1895-1953), best remembered for his galloping horses that injected dynamism into previously static forms of Chinese brushwork, is commemorated in this intriguing museum. Xu's success is celebrated here in seven halls and remembered in a collection of oils, gouache, pen and ink sketches, and portraits.
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Zhihua Temple
This rickety shrine is thick with the authentic flavours of old Peking, having eluded the slapdash renewal that invariably precedes entrance fee inflation and stomping tour groups. The Scriptures Hall encases a venerable Ming dynasty revolving wooden library and the Ten Thousand Buddhas Hall (Wànfó Diàn) is an enticing two floors of miniature niche-borne Buddhist effigies and cabinets for the storage of sutras.
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Zhongshan Park
This pleasant park sits west of the Gate of Heavenly Peace, with a section hedging up against the Forbidden City moat. A refreshing prologue or conclusion to the magnificence of the adjacent imperial residence, the park was formerly the sacred Ming-style Altar to the God of the Land and the God of Grain (Shèjìtán), where the emperor offered sacrifices. The square altar ( wǔsè tǔ ) remains, bordered on all sides by walls tiled in various colours.
