Sights in China
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Yuan-Dynasty Walls Relics Park
The name is rather an ambitious misnomer as there aren’t many genuine Yuan-dynasty relics here, but this slender strip of parkland, running alongside the Little Moon River (Xiǎoyuè Hé), commemorates a strip of the long-vanished Mongol city wall that it is built upon. At 9km in length, this is Běijīng’s longest parkland, beginning in Hǎidiàn district and charting a course east into Cháoyáng. The original wall was made of tamped earth, and not clad in brick like the later Ming- and Qing-dynasty city walls. It’s a relaxing place for a stroll and you can check out the Beijing Hundred-Bird Garden (Běijīng Bǎiniǎo Yuán), a sanctuary for thousands of fowl.
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Báimǎ Lóngtán
Báimǎ Lóngtán is a famous example of one of the pools that formed part of the web of arterylike canals that once brought the city's drinking water from Yuquan Spring (now called Black Dragon Pool Park). Where there are three pools, these were designated into pools for drinking, washing clothes and washing vegetables. Sadly, the days - not too long ago - when you would see locals washing their veggies in the streams after heading home from the market are a bit unthinkable now.
The town once had several water wheels, though the only one left now is Yulong Bridge Waterwheel, a reconstructed model at the north edge of the old town. The nearby monument celebrates Lìjiāng's…
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Rabse Nunnery
Hidden behind the hill that runs between the monastery and the dzong is Rabse Nunnery, a delightful place decorated with prayer flags, chörtens and mani lhakhangs. The 'correct' way to visit is along the clockwise pilgrim trail that goes around the back of the Pelkor Chöde Monastery. To start, follow the road up beside the monastery and then swing right onto the dirt kora path.
Bring a compass as the way back takes you through a maze of streets in the old town (but what views of the fort in the distance!) Bring water and lunch too as once you get out to this splendid open area you're going to want to continue to Riche Ganden Retreat. A round trip from central Gyantse to…
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Victoria Park
Victoria Park is the biggest patch of public greenery on Hong Kong Island. The best time to go is on a weekday morning, when it becomes a forest of people practising the slow-motion choreography of taichi. The park becomes a flower market a few days before the Chinese New Year. It’s also worth a visit during the Mid-Autumn Festival, when people turn out en masse carrying lanterns.
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Whampoa Military Academy
Day tripping on Chángzhōu Island (长洲岛; Chángzhōu Dǎo) is simply fun. Apart from a dozen of relatively undisturbed villages, the highlight on this island is this academy. Established in 1924 by the Kuomintang, it trained a number of military elites for both the Kuomintang and the CCP who went on to fight in many subsequent conflicts and civil wars. It was destroyed by the Japanese in 1938 and the present structure was restored in 1965. Today the complex houses a museum dedicated to the military history of modern China.
Take metro line 2 to Chìgǎng station, then exit C1. Board bus 262 on Xingang Zhonglu to Xīnzhōu pier (新洲码头; Xīnzhōu Mǎtou). Ferries (Y1.50) to the…
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Shanghai Botanical Gardens
The location just off the busy and polluted Longwu Rd is hardly idyllic, but the Botanical Gardens offer an escape from Shànghǎi’s synthetic cityscape. The Tropicarium gives you the chance to get close to tropical flora, and once inside, you can take the lift to the 6th floor for an impressive view of the gardens. Some of the flower arrangements are a little twee, but the place is well-maintained and bustling with visitors. The northern side of the gardens has a dusty memorial temple, originally built in 1728. It’s dedicated to Huang Daopo, who supposedly kick-started Shànghǎi’s cotton industry by bringing the knowledge of spinning and weaving to the region from…
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Former Residence of Tong Shaoyi
To the north of Xiāngzhōu, two sites are worth discovering in the labyrinth-like suburb of Tángjiāwān ( 唐家湾 ). Tangjia Public Garden was a private estate of the first premier of the Republic of China, Tong Shaoyi, in 1900. Now it is a tranquil garden preserving various old growth and rare species from South China. Take bus 10 on Yingbin Dadao and alight at Tangjia Market (Tángjiāshìcháng). A taxi from Gǒngběi to here is around Y60. The ticket to the garden includes admission to the nearby Former Residence of Tong Shaoyi, where this statesman was born. It’s accessible from the south gate of the garden.
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Former Furen University
This grand building on Dingfu Jie just around the corner from Prince Gong’s Residence once housed Furen University, founded by the Benedictine order in 1925. Today the magnificent building belongs to Beijing Normal University. On the wall to the west of the main door is a quality slogan from the Cultural Revolution, which poetically intones: 伟大的领袖毛主席是我们心中最红最红的红太阳 – ‘The mighty leader Chairman Mao is the reddest, reddest of red suns in our heart’. On the wall on the other side of the door is another lengthy slogan that has been largely blotted out.
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Guīyuán Temple
Pass a large rectangular pond where turtles cling like shipwrecked survivors to two metal lotus flowers and examine the magnificently burnished cabinet housing Milefo in the first hall. Also seek out this 350-year-old Buddhist temple's collection of more than 500 statues of enlightened disciples in the Hall of Arhats (罗汉堂; Luóhàn Táng). Completed in 1890, after nine years in the making, they remain in pristine condition. In the Mahasattva Pavilion (大士阁; Dàshì Gé), the 2m-high Tang-dynasty tablet carved with an image of Guanyin holding a willow branch is impressive and a jade Buddha can be found in the Cángjīng Pavilion (藏经阁; Cángjīng Gé). Bus 401 (Y2)…
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Memorial Hall of the Nánjīng Massacre
Hands down the best 'sight', if it can be called such, in Nánjīng. The unsettling exhibits at the Memorial Hall of the Nánjīng Massacre document the atrocities committed by Japanese soldiers against the civilian population during the occupation of Nánjīng in 1937. They include pictures of actual executions – many taken by Japanese army photographers – and a gruesome viewing hall built over a mass grave of massacre victims. Detailed captions are in English, Japanese and Chinese, but the photographs, skeletons and displays tell their own haunting stories without words. At times it feels a little overwhelming but visitors might begin to understand that the massacre is deeply…
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City Walls
Kāifēng is ringed by a relatively intact, much-restored Qing-dynasty wall. Encased with grey bricks, rear sections of the ramparts have been recently buttressed very unattractively with concrete. Today's bastion was built on the foundations of the Song-dynasty Inner Wall (内城; Nèichéng). Rising up beyond was the mighty, now buried Outer Wall (外城; Wàichéng), a colossal construction containing 18 gates, which looped south of the Pó Pagoda, while the Imperial Wall (皇城; Huángchéng) protected the imperial palace.
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Hong Kong Film Archive
The archive is worth a visit, even if you know little about Hong Kong film. It has over 6300 reels and tapes, as well as magazines, posters and scripts. There’s a small exhibition hall (opening hours vary) and a cinema. Check online for exhibitions and screenings. From the MTR station, walk north on Tai On St and west on Lei King Rd.
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Sunday Market
A Uighur primer: 'Boish-boish!' means 'Coming through!' You'd best hip yourself to this phrase, or risk being ploughed over by a push cart at the Sunday Market, which, despite its name, is open every day. Step carefully through the jam-packed entrance and allow your five senses guide you through the market; the pungent smell of cumin, the sight of scorpions in a jar, the sound of muqam from tinny radios, the taste of hot samsas and the feel of soft sheepskin caps are delightful, and overwhelming. A section on the northern side of the market contains everything of interest to foreign visitors, including the spice market, musical instruments, fur caps, kitschy souvenirs and…
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Chapel of the Dalai Lamas' Tombs
In the west wing of the assembly hall is one of the highlights of the Potala, the awe-inspiring Chapel of the Dalai Lamas' Tombs . The hall is dominated by the huge 12.6m-high chörten of the great fifth Dalai Lama, gilded with some 3700kg of gold. Flanking it are two smaller chörtens containing the 10th and 12th Dalai Lamas, who both died as children. Richly embossed, the chörtens represent the concentrated wealth of an entire nation.
One of the precious stones is a pearl said to have been discovered in an elephant's brains and thus, in a wonderful piece of understatement, 'considered a rarity'. Eight other chörtens represent the eight major events in the life of the…
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Hoi Ha Wan Marine Park
A rewarding 6km walk in the area starts from the village of Hoi Ha (literally ‘Under the Sea’) on the coast of Hoi Ha Bay, now part of the Hoi Ha Wan Marine Park, a 260-hectare protected area blocked off by concrete booms from the Tolo Channel and closed to fishing vessels. It’s one of the few places in Hong Kong waters where coral still grows in abundance and is a favourite with divers. You can visit anytime, but 1½-hour tours of the marine park are available in English at 10.30am and 2.15pm on Saturday, Sunday and public holidays. Be aware that you must register with the Agriculture, Fisheries & Conservation Department in advance, though.
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Húběi Provincial Museum
The centrepiece of this fabulous museum is the exhibition of the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng, which includes one of the world's largest musical instruments, a remarkable 5-tonne set of 64 double-tone bronze bells. The museum is beside the enormous East Lake (东湖; Dōng Hú), a pleasant area for cycling. Take bus 402 or 411.
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Tashilhunpo Monastery
Tashilhunpo is one of the few monasteries in Tibet that weathered the stormy seas of the Cultural Revolution relatively unscathed. It is a real pleasure to explore the busy cobbled lanes twisting around the ancient buildings - the monastery is essentially a walled town in its own right.
The monastery's standing rocketed when the fifth Dalai Lama declared his teacher - then abbot of Tashilhunpo - to be a manifestation of Öpagme (Amitabha; a deification of the Buddha's faculty of perfected cognition and perception). Thus Tashilhunpo became the seat of an important lineage: the Panchen Lamas. Panchen means 'great scholar' and the title was traditionally bestowed on abbots of…
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Temple of the Town God
Chinese towns traditionally came with a Taoist Temple of the Town God, but many fell victim to periodic upheaval. Originally dating to the early 15th century, this particular temple was badly damaged during the Cultural Revolution and later restored. Note the fine carvings on the roof as you enter to the main hall, dedicated to Huo Guang, a Han dynasty general, flanked by rows of effigies representing both martial and civil virtues. Exit the hall north and peek into the multifaith hall on your right dedicated to three female deities, Guanyin (Buddhist), Tianhou and Yanmu Niangniang (Taoist). Gazing fiercely over offerings of fruit from the rear hall is the red-faced and…
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Mao Dun Former Residence
This small and unassuming museum off Jiaodaokou Nandajie is deep in the heart of the historic hútòng quadrant southeast of the Drum and Bell Towers. Mao Dun was the pen name of Shen Yanbing (1896–1981), who was born into an elite family in Zhèjiāng province but educated in Běijīng. In 1920 he helped found the Literary Study Society, an association promoting literary realism. Mao Dun joined the League of Left Wing Writers in 1930, becoming solidly entrenched in the bureaucracy after the communists came to power. He lay low during the Cultural Revolution, but briefly returned to writing in the 1970s. The museum is typically parsimonious and low-key.
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People’s Park
Occupying the site of the colonial racetrack (which became a holding camp during WWII), People’s Park is a green refuge from Shànghǎi’s fume-ridden roads, with its Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art ) and pond-side bar, Barbarossa, all overlooked by Tomorrow Square, the Shanghai Art Museum and the Park Hotel. If you’re in Shànghǎi in June, join the photographers ringing the gorgeous pink lotuses that flower in the pond. On weekend mornings an unofficial matchmaking market is held here, where parents show up with their children’s CVs (but without the children) in an attempt to find a suitably successful spouse.
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Nancheng Mosque
The oldest mosque in Kūnmíng (or at least on the site where a mosque has sat the longest), the 400-year-old Nancheng Mosque can be recognised by its telltale greenish onion domes, though the lower floors essentially look like the white-tiled offices that they are!
Even worse, the once-lively strip of Muslim restaurants and shops selling skullcaps, Arabic calligraphy and pictures of Mecca nearby got its marching orders from the city government and has slowly been dispersing throughout the city. Not much is left. To get to what's left of the Muslim area from the Zhengyi Lu roundabout, walk west past Chūnchéng Jiǔlóu (Spring City Hotel) and then bear left a half-block to…
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Garden of the Master of the Nets
Off Shiquan Jie, this pocket-sized garden, the smallest in Sūzhōu, is considered one of the best preserved in the city. It was laid out in the 12th century, went to seed and was later restored in the 18th century as part of the home of a retired official turned fisherman (thus the name). The central section is the main garden. The western section is an inner garden where a courtyard contains the Spring Rear Cottage (Diànchūn Yì), the master's study.
The most striking feature of this garden is its use of space: the labyrinth of courtyards, with windows framing other parts of the garden, is ingeniously designed to give the illusion of a much larger area. Trivia nuts:…
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Cheung Po Tsai Cave
This 'cave' – in truth not much more than a hole in some rocks – on the southwestern peninsula of the island is said to have been the favourite hideout of the notorious pirate Cheung Po Tsai, who once commanded a flotilla of 600 junks and had a private army of 4000 men. He surrendered to the Qing government in 1810 and became an official himself, but his treasure is said to remain hidden here.
It's a 2km walk from Cheung Chau village along Sai Wan Rd, or take a kaido (adult/child from $3/2, dependent on passenger numbers) from the cargo ferry pier to the pier at Sai Wan. From here the walk is less than 200m (uphill).
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Lu Xun Park
Especially gorgeous in spring and summer when the trees are in blossom, Lu Xun Park is one of the city’s most pleasant parks, with elderly Chinese practising taichi or ballroom dancing, and even the occasional retired opera singer giving a free performance. The English corner on Sunday mornings is one of the largest in all of Shànghǎi and a good place to chat to locals in English. You can take boats out onto the small lake. The park used to be called Hongkou Park but was renamed because it holds Lu Xun’s Tomb, moved here from the International Cemetery in 1956, on the 20th anniversary of his death. Mao himself inscribed the memorial calligraphy.
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Shanghai Science & Technology Museum
This impressive space-age building aims at providing a fun educational experience. Kids will like the Light of Wisdom hall, with its hands-on science experiments, and the audiovisual rides (including an earthquake simulator) are fun but draw long queues. Surprisingly, there is nothing on Chinese science and technology (this is, after all, the land that brought us fireworks and the rudder). There are four theatres (two IMAX, one 4D and one outer space), that show themed films throughout the day (tickets Y20 to Y40; 15 to 40 minutes). When you need a break there’s a good food court for lunch; get your hand stamped with a pass if you want to return to the exhibits.
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