Kunming 昆明

1

A 'jade within the city' at the heart of Kunming's old town, also known as Nine Dragon Pool because 'nine springs emerge and gather into a pond'; Bamboo Island, Goldfish Island and Lianhua Chan Temple (initiated by Chen Can in the late Qing) on the lake are linked by causeways and bridges; with weeping willows and green water in all seasons, it is the starting point of everyday Kunming life and slow wandering through the old town

2

A modern-style army school founded in 1909 in the late Qing, ranked together with the Tianjin and Northeast Jiangwutang as the three great military academies of the late Qing; its beige courtyard complex in the 'zouma zhuanjiaolou' style (linked corridors and corner towers) encloses the parade ground, making it one of China's best-preserved modern military academy sites

3

Donglu University, founded in 1922 by Tang Jiyao, was one of the earliest modern institutions of higher learning in southwest China; the campus stands on the former site of the Ming-Qing Yunnan Gongyuan (provincial examination hall), where Zhigong Hall (the main hall of the examination cells) still survives

4

Back lanes right next to the west gate of Yunnan University, named 'Wenlin' in the Qing dynasty for their proximity to the Confucian Temple school; today a coffee street where Kunming's young people and international students gather, with dozens of independent cafés, craft-beer bars and second-hand bookshops lining the slope

5

The last contiguous stretch of old streets left in Kunming's urban area, the commercial hub of the provincial capital since the Ming and Qing dynasties; Wenming Street, Guanghua Street and Yongdao Street criss-cross in a grid, with rows of shops under grey-tiled pitched roofs

6

Two street-spanning memorial archways first built in the Ming Xuande era; the east arch stands by the "Golden Horse" and the west arch near the "Jade Rooster" — the source of Kunming's ancient name "Golden Horse and Jade Rooster". A spiritual emblem of the city, they were destroyed in modern times and rebuilt to their original look in 1997.

7

Kunming's first commercial pedestrian street; since its expansion in the 1920s it has remained the commercial heart of the provincial capital, with time-honored shops standing shoulder to shoulder with new department stores.

8

Kunming's oldest Buddhist temple, on the site of the Butuoluo Temple of the Tang-era Nanzhao period; extended under the Song and Yuan, it has some 1,200 years of history and is revered as "the foremost monastery of Yunnan Esoteric Buddhism".

9

An ancient temple founded in the Tang Zhenguan era, named — by legend — for the qiong bamboo that came back to life while a wonder-working monk preached in Kunming; it hides in pine woods at the foot of Yu'an Hill west of the city.

10

A thousand-year-old ferry town on the north shore of Dianchi Lake; in Tang and Song times it was the water-and-land wharf for officials traveling to and from the lake, hence the name "Guandu"; its "Eight Scenic Views" were famed of old.

11

The core building of the Taoist Taihe Palace atop Mingfeng Hill north of the city; founded in the 30th year of the Ming Wanli reign by provincial governor Chen Yongbin, the present bronze hall was recast in the 10th year of the Qing Kangxi reign by Wu Sangui, Prince Who Pacifies the West; weighing over 250 tons, with beams, columns, dougong brackets, doors and windows all cast in bronze, it is China's largest surviving bronze hall, dazzling gold in the sun…

12

A millennia-old temple complex at the foot of Longquan Mountain in the city's north; the Longquan Daoist Temple was founded during the Tang-era Nanzhao period and expanded through the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, known as "the foremost ancient temple of central Yunnan"

13

Yunnan's largest freshwater lake, approx. 330 sq km in area at an elevation of 1,886 m, hailed as the "Pearl of the Plateau"; the lake shapes Kunming's climate — the thermostat behind the city's year-round spring weather

14

A grotto-and-plank-walk system chiseled into the cliff of Luohan Mountain, the highest peak of the Western Hills; it took 72 years to complete, from the Qianlong to the Xianfeng reigns of the Qing, as Daoist priests and craftsmen carved the "Longmen Datian Pavilion" (Dragon Gate Reaching-Heaven Pavilion) hammer and chisel along the cliff, with the walkway clinging to sheer rock hundreds of meters above Dianchi Lake

15

An ethnic-culture theme park on the shore of Dianchi Lake presenting miniature reconstructions of village architecture and life scenes of 25 of Yunnan's ethnic minorities — the Dai white pagoda and water-splashing ground, the Bai "three houses and one screen wall", the Naxi Dongba culture village, the Jingpo Munao song-and-dance ground, each in its own style — a full sweep of Yunnan's ethnic life in one day…

16

A three-story tower on the north shore of Dianchi Lake, built in 1690 (the 29th year of the Kangxi reign of the Qing) under Governor Wang Jiwen and named for its "grand views of lake and mountain"; the best-preserved classical tower in Kunming

17

A millennium-old monastery deep in the Western Hills, first built during the Zhenguan era of the Tang and renamed Huating Chan Temple in the Song; in modern times it was revived under the great master Monk Xuyun, becoming the foremost Chan (Zen) monastery in central Yunnan

18

UNESCO World Natural Heritage site (inscribed 2007) and Global Geopark; limestone laid down on an ancient seabed 270 million years ago, carved by eons of water erosion and karstification into a karst wonderland of sword-, tower-, and mushroom-shaped stone peaks, hailed as 'the most spectacular wonder under heaven'

19

National 4A-rated cave complex; more than a hundred caves have developed in the Jiuxiang hills of Yiliang, earning geologists' title of 'museum of caves'

20

Yunnan's largest comprehensive museum, with a collection of over 230,000 objects and two strengths unmatched in southwest China: the Warring States bronze civilization of the Dian kingdom — the Ox-Tiger Bronze Table (a bronze masterpiece with a tiger biting the ox's waist and a calf sheltering beneath its tail), the Gilded Rider Cowrie Container with Four Oxen, and more — freezing scenes of the Dian people's rituals of 2,000 years ago...

21

China's largest ethnic-themed museum, on the shore of Dianchi Lake beside the Ethnic Villages; woven around the everyday objects of 25 ethnic minorities — ethnic costumes and brocades, musical instruments, masks, wamao roof cats, ethnic scripts and ancient books displayed by category, with the Li brocade of 'dragon quilt' fame set against Yunnan's...

22

On the campus of Yunnan Normal University, at the original site of the National Southwest Associated University — formed in 1938 when Peking, Tsinghua, and Nankai universities moved south to Kunming

23

Asia's largest fresh-flower trading market; about 7 of every 10 cut flowers sold in China come from Dounan, where roses, carnations, and baby's breath are sold by the sack and weighed by the jin — a flower bazaar full of wonderfully raw energy

24

A research-oriented botanical garden under the Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, holding Yunnan's rich plant germplasm, with camellias, rhododendrons, and magnolias taking the stage in turn through the four seasons

25

A man-made waterfall park built as part of the Niulan River–Dianchi Lake water replenishment project, with cascades hundreds of meters wide pouring down tier by tier from artificial channels and dams, approaching the force of a natural waterfall and known as one of Asia's largest artificial waterfall landscapes, while also serving the engineering function of replenishing Dianchi Lake

26

A millennium-old hot spring on the Tanglang River in Anning, on Kunming's southwestern outskirts, with records of development dating back to the Han dynasty; Ming-dynasty top scholar Yang Shen inscribed it 'First Spring under Heaven.' Its calcium-magnesium carbonate water is warm and gentle on the skin, and since the Ming and Qing it has been a health resort of southwest China, its cliffs covered with inscriptions by modern celebrities

27

The highest peak of central Yunnan, on the border of Luquan and Dongchuan, at 4,247 meters above sea level; named for its shape like a bridal sedan chair and revered as a sacred mountain by the Yi people

28

A red-earth plateau landscape around Huashitou Village in Dongchuan District, northeast of Kunming; iron- and aluminum-rich red soil, cultivated for a thousand years, interweaves with the color patches of crops such as potatoes, buckwheat, and rapeseed, shifting with the seasons into a ground palette of orange, red, and emerald green—most photogenic from July to September and November to December

29

A deep highland lake in Chengjiang, southeast of Kunming—Yunnan's third-largest lake and, at about 155 meters at its deepest, one of China's deepest inland freshwater lakes, with water clarity the finest in Yunnan and Guizhou; the ancients praised it as 'ten thousand hectares of glaze'