THE GUIDE - The Rough Guide to Beijing - page 142

The palace buildings, many connected by a suitably majestic gallery, are built on and around
Wanshou Shan (Longevity Hill), north of the lake and just in from the East Gate. Many
of the palace edifices are intimately linked with Cixi - anecdotes about whom are the stock
output of the numerous tour guides - but to enjoy the site, you need know very little of its
history: like Beihai , the park, its lake and pavilions form a startling visual array, akin to a
traditional Chinese landscape painting brought to life.
BOAT SERVICES TO THE SUMMER PALACE
The fastest route to the Summer Palace is to take the subway, but there's also a boat
service that leaves from Zizhuyuan Park and behind the Beijing Exhibition Hall (hourly
10am-5pm; ￥ 70 including park ticket to palace). The route follows the old imperial ap-
proach along the now dredged and prettified Long River, passing attractive bridges and
willow groves en route. Your vessel will either be a large, dragon-shaped cruiser or a smal-
ler four-person speedboat.
Brief history
There have been imperial summer pavilions at the Summer Palace since the eleventh century,
although the present park layout is essentially eighteenth-century, created by the Manchu Em-
peror Qianlong. However, the key character associated with the palace is the Dowager Em-
press Cixi , who ruled over the fast-disintegrating Chinese empire from 1861 until her death
in 1908. The Summer Palace was very much her pleasure ground; it was she who built the
palaces here in 1888 after the original palace was destroyed by Western forces during the
Opium Wars, and determinedly restored them after another bout of European aggression in
1900.