Beijing Summer Palace (Friday, August 17th, 2018 )

After climbing the Great Wall, we enjoyed a nice healthy Chinese lunch, and then continued outside the city to the fabled Summer Palace.  The Beijing Summer Palace is the biggest Imperial Garden in the world. It was built as a former resort of the Empress Dowager, and is a vast collection of lakes, gardens, pavilions and palaces.  It covers just over a square mile, and three-quarters of it is water. 

If you find the perfect location for your summer palace, but it doesn't have a lake, what do you do?  You dig one!

That is exactly how this summer palace came to be!



August is the most popular month for domestic tourism in China because all of the kids are out of school on their summer break, so the palace grounds were extremely crowded.  

So we had to use our imaginations to envision how beautiful and peaceful it would have been to have these 700 acres all to ourselves.

As we entered the palace, the first thing we noticed were all of the beautiful sandstone rocks.

And great Chinese statues.

We walked by the outside of the palace - visitors weren't allowed inside.  There wasn't room to get a picture of the whole thing, but this is a nice representation of what it looked like.

From the palace residence, there is a covered corridor that is 2340 feet long, the longest corridor in the world. This is where the emperor and empress would take their walks.

Walking through the corridor, there is a continuous reflexology path that gives your feet a great massage as you walk.

From the pavilion we enjoyed beautiful views of the lotus, the lake and the surrounding gardens.

From the corridor you can also see the beautiful bronze Baoyun Pavilion.

When this land was chosen for the Summer Palace, it did not have a lake on it.  The lake was hand dug, and is only about 7 feet deep.  It adds a lot of ambiance to the property and helps to keep it cool.

The dirt removed from the lake was used to build a man made mountain called Longevity Hill, which is about 200 feet high, and  is host to the Pavilion of the Buddhist Incense. 

A well know saying in China is that water supports a boat, but it can also turn over the boat.  This saying came from the tumultuous history of China and the many take-overs and changes in government.  The water represents the people of China and the boat represent the government.  Rulers of China knew that with the support of the people they could stay in charge, but if the people revolted, they could overturn the government.

Emperor Qianlong, with this in mind, decided to build a boat that couldn't be overturned, signifying that he was invincible and his reign as emperor would never end.  So he built a large boat, made completely out of marble, which stands in the man made lake. 

While we were waiting for our dragon boat, we took a few more pictures of the beautiful gardens at the palace.

When our dragon boat arrived, we took a relaxing dragon boat ride across the lake, where we could view the bridge and island more closely.  

Yes, the bridge and island are still part of the summer palace.  Aah to be an empress.  

Looking back at the palace from the lake.

We disembarked our dragon boat on the opposite side of the lake where there were huge lines waiting to board the boats.  It made us so happy that we were with Gate-1 because we boarded the boat very quickly with no lines.

When there are such huge crowds, it is hard to imagine the tranquility of a place like this, but looking back at the pictures, it is a little easier to see. 


When we finished at the summer palace, we made a quick stop so that everyone could see the birds nest of the 2008 summer Olympics (which we had already seen up close and personal), then we continued on to dinner. We had a small banquet room to ourselves, where we were served an amazing dinner featuring Peking duck and wine. 

Oh yeah, and a toast with fire water to start off our wonderful experience.

We are in awe about the amount of food that is served at every meal. There are so many options to choose from, and all of the food is so good!  We are a little bit worried to see how much we weigh at the end of this trip, but oh well.  We'll only be in China once!