It was our last day in Beijing, Sabrina and I would be moving on to another area, and we still hadn't been to the Fobidden City. We tried to go one time but the line ups and crowds really turned me off. I hate crowds of tourists, and I hate waiting in long lines to pay people money, it doesn't make sense to me. Sabrina really wanted to go though, and we had both decided that if there was something the other really wanted to do, even if we personally didn't, we would do it.
Well it turns out that was a great decision on Sabrina's part (as usual) because I absolutely loved the Forbidden City. The history, the architecture, the stonework, the insane, unimaginable attention to detail, it was all completely fascinating to me. So thank you Sabrina for convincing me to go, haha.
It kinda goes without saying but if you're in Beijing, yeah, just don't miss the Forbidden City like I almost (stupidly) did. It is an incredible sight to see.
The Forbidden City
Sabrina standing just outside the main entrance to the Forbidden City
A vertical shot to give more perspective about the incredible size of this place
Of course Carrothead needed a shot here too. This is actually a three shot stich
Birds outside the wall
Entering the main gate
Yeah, that's a pretty thick front wall
Inside the first courtyard, lots of families visit the Forbidden City.
I loved the look of the paving stones in this courtyard area
Sabrina standing in one of the many courtyard gates
That's me! In one of the largest courtyards, it's a massive place.
This is the spot to take the photo
There were several of these massive carved stone scenes. They were cut from single blocks of stone in a quarry outside of Beijing and transported on a road of ice in the winter as single slabs. You really have to see them to understand how epic they are, but I got a few photos that I think are pretty cool
The detail on them was absolutely incredible
Standing guard. You can see one of the carved stones in the back to left
Please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe this was the actual throne room of the emperor. It was incredible either way
There are so many incredible buildings in the city, but you aren't allowed to go into most of them. You basically just go in a straight line through the city, only seeing a tiny part of it, but even that small part is huge.
Rooftops
The workmanship of this place is truly incredible
Incredible detail everywhere you look, even way up on top of the roof
I took the following two photos to show the absolutely insane attention to detail that went into the construction of these buildings. Notice the incredibly intricate painting and gilding on every single beam, even going all the way into the joining where nobody would ever see. Also, this ceiling was a solid 40 or 50 feet high. Incredible
These pieces were used to join the window frames, they were on every single joint of every single window, and the detail of the scenes on them is stunning. The workmanship of every part of this place was really beyond compare.
I'm not sure what the significance of this is, but it was very popular to touch the lion/dragon heads on this particular giant vessel.
They've been worn down quite a bit over the years
These dog eared lion/dragon guard guys were pretty intense. They were almost a bit scary just to look at, very fierce and intimidating, the sculpting work of them was incredible.
Towards the back of the city is this very peaceful garden/pond/pagoda area. There were pools full of Koi and this amazing stone that was built up into a miniature mountain area.
Here is the interior ceiling of the pagoda from the previous photo. The insane attention to detail just doesn't stop in this place. Do you see the dragon staring down at you?
The interior ceiling of another pagoda near by
The mini mountain area. You couldn't go in there but it looked really cool
The last photo I took on our way out of the city
Tiananmen Square
I know this post is pretty long already, but I thought I would just include these few photos of Tiananmen Square as well. It's also an amazing thing to see, the scale of the place is simply immense, and it has a very different atmosphere than anything else we visited. It was really interesting to just be there and walk around.
Work was being done on the statue while we were there
Sabrina at Tiananmen Square
The Square itself is accessed by an underground section so that people don't have to cross the street above, it's a very busy area
One of my favorite photos from Beijing, and I think a fitting way to say goodbye to the city
Well, that's it for our tour of the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square, and that's it for Beijing! In the next post I'm going to be showing photos from our further travels in China, including the ancient walled city of Pingyao (one of my favorite places), the Terracotta Warriors at Xian, and an amazing little village we visited in the Yonshuo area.
If you missed the first two parts of our trip to China you can check out my previous posts here:
Traveling in China Part I: The streets of Beijing, lost in translation, and people around town
Traveling in China Part II: Walking on the Great Wall
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Dexter