Best of China

Explore the landmark sights of ancient and modern China with a licensed local guide. Covering the area of 90 football fields, Tiananmen Square can hold over 300,000 people and has always been the site for public proclamations and demonstrations. Mao Tse Tung announced the founding of Communist China here in 1949, and 40 years later student protests against the excesses of that government led to the massacres that unfortunately remain the square's foremost association in the minds of most visitors. The gate at the southern end of the square marks the old city walls, not removed until 1958. See the nerve center of modern China in the adjoining People's Hall, the legislative building, where each of the 32 reception rooms is lavishly decorated in the style of a different province or city. In the main hall, 500 light bulbs illuminate the enormous red star on the ceiling. Move into ancient China in the Forbidden City, the formidable 9,000-room palace complex -- protected by a 170ft.-wide moat -- that housed China's emperors from 1421 until 1923. Think that's grand? The 700 acres of the Summer Palace, a seasonal retreat for the emperors, include a half-mile hallway painted with scenes from China's history, the most beautiful gardens in the country, and a 118ft. carved marble boat decked out with stained-glass windows so that the empress could enjoy her palace lakes in private.

Stretching from Korea to the Gobi Desert, the Great Wall of China reaches 1,500 miles along old imperial borders. The wall was built mainly by millions of slaves, repairing and lengthening existing defensive walls throughout the centuries (the oldest dating back to the 5th century BC), until the massive structure was complete. Sentries posted at the stone watchtowers along its length could use smoke to signal an imminent attack.

An emperor with a home as elaborate as the Imperial Palace needs an equally elaborate final resting place, and the Ming Tombs fit the bill quite nicely. Overseen by the same emperor, Yongle, who constructed the Forbidden City, the Ming Tombs are an enormous complex of pavilions, gardens, hallways, and tombs designed to provide everything an emperor, empress, or favored concubine would need in the afterlife. Check out the Avenue of Stone Animals, where a dozen pairs of carved animals, some dating back to the 1400s, and half a dozen pairs of carved officials and soldiers wait to escort their leaders to heaven.

Forget Cirque de Soleil -- Beijing's Acrobatic Troupe has been performing for more than 50 years, and their combination of superb acrobatics, juggling, magic, and more has made them the world's best acrobatic ensemble.

Digging beneath Xian can be a rewarding task. Well-diggers in the 1970s stumbled onto an amazing site -- an underground cavern filled with thousands and thousands of life-size terra cotta soldiers and horses. Each soldier is unique, with facial expressions that may have been modelled after a real imperial soldier, and was designed to guard the tomb of Qin Shi Huang. In 1953 workers digging a factory foundation just outside the city in Banpo found the remains of the most complete Neolithic settlement in the world; the artifacts indicate that the settlement was matriarchal, with women controlling food production and the family lineage. Emperors did their own digging at Huaqing, creating an imperial hot spring resort and palace. Dig into history yourself with a local licensed guide.

Originally built in 1370 and bricked in 1568, the enormous city walls surrounding Xi'an now serve less as defense against outside attack than as pretty packaging for a peaceful town. Take a look around with your Tour Director, then head to the Greater Wild Goose Pagoda. Rising about 200 feet from the center of a temple, the pagoda has seven stories and elaborate carvings over each doorway. No one's sure why the pagoda is named after a goose, but take a gander at the outstanding views available at each of the windows. Residents often toss a coin or two out of these windows for good luck.

Shanghai combines European elegance with Asian flair, transforming its colonial history with a unique modern outlook. See the highlights with a local licensed guide. Surrounded by a busy bazaar, the Yu Yuan Garden offers an amazingly peaceful escape into a sixteenth-century garden with fountains, bridges, and tile dragons undulating along the walls. More peace reigns at the temple of the Jade Buddha, where two exquisitely carved Buddha statues, each carved from a single piece of jade, keep watch over a community of monks.

Stroll the most impressive street in Shanghai. The Bund, the center of colonial Shanghai, now offers an array of elegant embassies, banks, tea houses, and five-star hotels. Even more impressive is the mansion housing the Children's Palace. Once a private residence, the marbled and chandeliered building now offers after-school education for gifted children. Find your own gifts on Nanjing Road, the city's premiere shopping street.