Beijing Summer Palace (Yi He Yuan) Tickets

Visit: Summer Palace (Yiheyuan), No.19 Xinjian Gongmen Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100080 China

The Summer Palace is a vast ensemble of lakes, gardens and palaces in Beijing. It was an imperial garden in the Qing Dynasty. Mainly dominated by Longevity Hill and Kunming Lake, it covers an expanse of 2.9 square kilometres (1.1 sq mi), three-quarters of which is water. The central Kunming Lake, covering 2.2 square kilometres (540 acres), was entirely man-made and the excavated soil was used to build Longevity Hill. The King and Queen of Qing Dynasty use to spend their summer time in this place, and that is why it is called Summer Palace. In December 1998, United Nations Education Science and Culture Organization (UNESCO) included the Summer Palace on its World Heritage List. It declared the Summer Palace "a masterpiece of Chinese landscape garden design. The natural landscape of hills and open water is combined with artificial features such as pavilions, halls, palaces, temples and bridges to form a harmonious ensemble of outstanding aesthetic value".