China - Beijing - Summer Palace

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We went to the Summer Palace in the afternoon after we visited Mutianyu. We left Mutianyu at about 1pm and arrived at the Summer Palace just before 3pm. We hired a driver to take us around that day, so had a nice 2 hour nap during the travel time.

Apart from the entrance fee to the Summer Palace, 5 sites within the Summer Palace required additional entrance fees. At the entrance, you can either buy 1) a combo ticket which includes the entrance fee to the Summer Palace and the other 5 sites, or 2) a ticket which includes the entrance fee to the Summer Palace only. If you choose option 2), you can pay for the entrance fees for the sites you want to visit once you are inside the Palace. We recommend option 2) because the combo ticket did not provide a discount compared to buying the tickets separately and we did not end up going to all the sites covered by the combo ticket.

The Summer Palace was a place the emperor visited during the summer. When we were there, we could feel that it was cooler compared to Beijing City. There was a large lake in the middle of the Palace and a summer breeze from time to time made the walk refreshing. The bridge over the lake and the nicely decorated corridors were my favorite parts of the Palace. There were many parts of the Palace which reminded us of the Forbidden City, for example the buildings.

There was a boat which took people from one side of the lake to the other side. There was a fee required to catch this boat and the queue was very long.
We spent about 2 hours at the Summer Palace and finished our day trip with a short stopover at entrance of the renowned Tsing Hua University.

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