1-Day Civil Culture Tour in Kunming

In the morning, you will meet your tour guide at the gate of Yuantong Temple (No. 42, Yuantong Jie) where locals find peace and harmony in a noisy neighborhood. Here you can see Southern Buddhism, Northern Buddhism, and Tibetan Buddhism all at the same time. From there we will walk to Yunnan university and see some less known ancient cultural sites of Kunming city. Behind the university there is a charming narrow street named Wenhua Xiang (Culture Alley) with many small coffee shops, special bookstores, bars and all kinds of food from all over the world.

After lunch, we will walk to Yunnan military academy, which was a famous military school in the last century. Learn about recent Chinese military history and Kunming’s importance as a military center. From there we will walk through the Green Lake park to Jingxing Bird and Flower Market. The Green Lake is the bustling green center of Kunming city. Stroll through this beautiful park to see the daily life of modern Chinese people, where people practice Taiichi, local middle-aged ladies come to ‘square dance’ and grandpa’s jam together with their traditional Chinese instruments. In summer the whole lake is covered with a carpet of fragrant lotus flowers, in the winter the lake is filled with thousands of seagulls that migrate here from Siberia. Jingxing Flower and Bird Market reflects the Old Kunming way of life, with a lot of people selling flowers, birds, fish, insects, bamboo bongs and pipes. Sometime you can even see old people “Liu Niao” which means they take their bird cages out for a walk in the park.