Hancunhe Scenic Area is located at Fangshan District about 40 kilometers from Beijing. There are many uniquely designed villas situated around this area. Moreover, the wide street, elegant building architecture, modern fresh market, hotels, university, parks as well as other infrastructure have all provide a brand new look of a modernize farm of China. Thus, Hancunhe has been voted as the Top Village which is located around Beijing as well as awarded as the Village Town.

When you are walking along the street of Hancunhe, you will feel as if walking along the street of any small town of some European country. Perhaps, this is due to the peaceful surrounding as well as the lush greenery on both sides of the roads. The uniquely designed western style villas along the road might also cause you to feel as if you are currently not in Beijing. Nowadays, Hancunhe has been developed into an AAA Scenic Area. It is well known for its new look of modern farming in China. When you are here, you may experience the life of a local farmer where you can stay with the locals, taste their daily dishes, as well as be involved in fruit picking activities. Moreover, there are some angling pongs around which allows you to spend your leisure time with the nature and feel the cool breeze on your face.

Features: The road is even and wide with trees on both sides. People can view the development of the new socialist countryside, enjoy the pastoral scenes of the rural scene and understand the course of development of Hancunhe.

The Cuanbai Scenic Area is located in Zhaitang Town, in the Mentougou District, covering an area of 46.6 square kilometers. The scenic area was created in 2009. It consists of four areas: The Cuandixia Village, the Double Stone Village, the Boyu Village and the Huanglingxi Village. The villages in Cuanbai Scenic Area are mostly old villages, so tourists who come here will have a look at the historic sites that were built years ago and will have general information about China’s historic past.

The Cuanbai Scenic Area is a great place to visit for anyone specializing in history, culture, architecture, or sociology. It has received numerous awards from the Ministry of Construction, the National Bureau of Cultural Relics, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and the Beijing municipal government for being the most invaluable ancient village in China as well as an excellent tourist destination and for establishing itself as the best ancient village for tourism and cultural heritage in Beijing.

The Cuanbai Scenic Area is really a special destination for tourists because one can view various historic sites that will most certainly differ from anything you’ve seen in Beijing. Here you can see villages from the Ming Dynasty, wall paintings of the Qing Dynasty, cultural relics of houses that were burnt down by the Japanese Army during WWI and logos from the 1950s-1970s,ancient roads, wells, temples, and stages.

Features:

Cuandixia Village

Are you interested in visiting the ancient dwelling houses not far from Beijing which boast the characteristics of South China? It is recommended that you visit the Cuandixia ancient village located in the suburb of Beijing city. This village is also called the Potala Palace in Beijing due to its unique construction style. It is favored by many photography enthusiasts and painters. With a hundred year's history, the village still keeps its traditional folk culture. Situated at the mountain canyon, the village is surrounded by green pines and verdant cypresses. The trees make a pleasant shade around, and the melodious sound of the birds breaks the silence of the village now and again, making you feel as if you were in a totally different world.

Developed by Zhaitang Town government together with Beijing Cimingyuan Culture Development Co., Ltd, Scutellaria Fairy Valley Scenic Spot is engaged in planting, processing, promoting and marketing Chinese traditional medicine scutellaria tea. It is located at the extension of Cuandixia Village, Zhaitang Town, Mentougou District.

Scutellaria Fairy Village Scenic Spot is an international research base of Scutellaria culture and inheritance place of non-material culture heritage of Scutellaria processing. It is also the only tourism industry park of Scutellaria culture. What is more, it is also a good place for visitors to carry out outdoor painting.

Features:

At the entrance of the scenic spot you may see the white marble bridge and antique gate tower. The cultural corridor and traveler receipt area are arranged separately on the right and left side of the gate tower.

There are two antique Siheyuan there. Within the first one, visitors can observe how the Scutelaria is processed, while in the second one it is equipped with some Geothermal heating rooms including the Presidential Suite and FIT (Foreign Independent Tourist) compartment etc. Between the two Siheyuans, some regional specialties from Mentougou District are presented in the show room. Furthermore, the easy life living area, Chinese medicine area, leisure & vacation area and Chinese medicine ancestor worshipping area are located on several terraces of the mountain for different visitors.

As for the beauty there in Scutellaria Fairy Valley Scenic Spot, it looks attractive all year long. In spring, visitors can see the light green and light yellow tender scutellaria leaves; in summer, visitors can enjoy the blossom of scutellaria flowers, which spread everywhere; in autumn, all the trees seemed to be dyed and the snow in winter will make visitors feel very cool.

Double Dragon Gorge Scenic Spot is a newly developed scenic spot in the Western area of Beijing. It is located in the Castle Peak, Green Valley, and 2.5 km south of Fire Village, Zhaitang Town and Mengtougou District.

The main image of Double Dragon Gorge Scenic Spot can be summarized quite succinctly: ten miles of streams, the baekdamsa waterfall, one thousand mu of apricots, a ten thousand hectare forest, a castle peak, a scenic green valley, a white hills area that looks like the sea and peaks that often tower so beautifully that it’s been called “small Jiuzhaigou” and "one hundred waterfalls" by visitors of the area.

Features:

Tourists can admire apricot flowers in March and April and enjoy the fantastic spectacle with the coexistence of wild flowers and ice falls in April and May. From June to October, they can appreciate streams, waterfalls, pools, apricot orchard, forest of thousands of hectares, green hills and valleys, and the resort of peace and happiness. Tourists can also pick big red apricots and walnuts in Huo Village and apples and red grapes in the surrounding area when fruits are ripe. In October and November, they can enjoy the bright colors of the autumn leaves all over the mountains and organize activities of drawing and photograph taking. In December, they can walk along glaciers and marvel at icefalls.

There are two dams at the entrance to the park, which retains water over ten thousand cubic meters. Visitors can also find two natural waterfalls about 25 meters and countless waterfalls below ten meters. Wildlife resources are abundant in the Park. It is not only a natural "Big Oxygen Bar" for people to relax and take a vacation, but also a natural "Big Classroom" for teenagers to have science lessons. With abundant natural resources, the Forest Park will develop into a marvelous scenic spot.

Boasting a long history, the park has numerous historic sites and temples, including Shengquan Temple, Huayan Temple, the Temple of the Dragon King, Mountain God Temple, Mawang Temple, and Wudao Temple. Also, there are the Overhead Building Projection, the Ancient Tower, Shunhe Tower at the entrance to Huo Village, and Huiguang Nun's Tower. In addition, the place is famous for its culture and the historical legend that Li Wanfang fought against the leopard.

Qipanshan Scenic Spot is located in the western Beijing mountainous areas, 15 km from Changping and 60 km from Beijing. Qipanshan Scenic Spot covers 4 square km and is in the southwest of the Wayao village, with an elevation of 312 meters. The mountain peak area is 3,000 square meters, the mountain top flat and the ratio of length and width just like an enlarged chessboard.

According to legends, on lunar April 8 of each year, fairies, mostly old men, come to play chess and compete with each other.

Features: Fairy Temple in Qipanshan commonly known as “Empress Temple” was built on lunar April 8, Jiajing 43 years (A.D. 1564) in the Ming dynasty. So, it has a history of more than 400 years. According to legend, Wayao Fairy Temple and Miaofengshan Empress Temple are sister temples. There is a Peace Temple, Three Sides Guanyin, the Russian-style Park, Yanshan Lake Water Park, Matoushan viewing platform, 370 meters cultural corridor, immortal chess playing and other tourist attractions in Qipanshan. With a beautiful environment and pleasant climate, the scenic spot is very suitable for holiday tours around Beijing suburbs.

Take Subway Line Chaoping Line to Changping (Exit C), get on Bus No. 357 to Wayao and walk 2.5 km to the scenic spot.

The Waxworks Palace opened in August 1994 and displays the living during the Ming Dynasty by using wax figures. The whole palace area is 133,400 square meters and holds 374 wax statues. It is one of the largest waxworks museums in Asia. The Ming Dynasty is a turning point in Chinese history.

At the waxworks exhibition, visitors can view the business and trade that took place during that time as well as everyday situations of the moments in ancient China. For example, one can view how ancient people bought and sold silk, pottery and cotton. The life-size figures will be displayed vividly for patrons to view. Furthermore, visitors can read the “compendium of medical material”. It is among the few books that have significant influence on Chinese Modern Medical Theory. Moreover, the scene of Zhenghe’s traveling to more than 30 countries by sea in 1405 also will be reproduced at the exhibition.

Covering an area of 8,000 hectares, the Python Mountain National Forest Park is the largest of its kind in Beijing. The park is home to 176 plant species and 96 percent of the park area is covered by forests. The most important species are evergreens such as Chinese pine, arborvitae, and lacebark pine.

Walking in the forest and listening to the sound of the mountain breeze is a refreshing experience. Winter jasmine, mountain peach, Ansu apricot, forsythia, clove, flowering almond, Chinese herbaceous peony, Chinese rose, and cherry blossom blooming in succession turns the park into a vast sea of amazing shapes and colors. The fiery red foliage, from smoke tree, mono maple, typhina, to Japanese creeper, tells visitors everything about autumn's splendor.

Over the past years, the Mangshan Mountain has been the voluntary tree planting base for central government organizations. In 1983 and 1984, state leaders including Deng Xiaoping, Wan Li, and Hu Yaobang came here twice to plant trees. The lacebark and Chinese pines they planted are now flourishing with verdant foliage. A Greening Pavilion and hundreds of tablets bearing inscriptions of celebrities are erected in the park, representing the visitors' strong patriotism and awareness of protecting nature and greening the country.

Features:

Forest of Steles: Python Mountain Park fan platform. There is an overflow color that runs through the Dan Afforestation Pavilion, with quotations from ancient inscriptions of Deng Xiaoping, as well as dozens of foreign central unit and the friendship tree planting memorials. Pines and cypresses and monuments set off to form a timeless theme.

Tianchi: State eighty-five key projects, “the Ming Tombs Pumped Storage Power Station” in the pool, entrenched in the Python Peak volume 4.45 million cubic meters, 37 meters water depth, is the largest artificial Tianchi, like a mirror being mounted on the peaks.

Guta: On the summit of the Python Mountain, a highest tower Gumingta, towering pagodas and directing to the sky, is the Ming Dynasty Way back downtown, flourishing across the sky, which makes a sudden and devastating health rib wings - Happy Chu Chen, who flew into just to meditate.

Laughing Buddha: Beijing’s biggest stone carving Maitreya Buddha is 9.9 meters high, master of the system and looks vivid. At the foot of stone statue, Yang Guan Maitreya Buddha sitting on a lotus cushion laughs with an easygoing nature.

Local soldiers and civilians, led by the Communist Party, creatively invented the tunnel warfare according to the local situation. At first, the tunnels they made could only hold one or a couple of persons; later they came to connect every house and every village in the area, serving as underground fortresses, with holes for lookout and shooting, commanding posts, and flexible boards to ward off water, poison and toxic gases. The entrances, exits, and shooting holes, hidden in floors, kang (Chinese earthen bed), chambers of the kitchen ranges, mangers, walls of wells, or under millstones, were difficult for the enemy to discover.

By 1946, the total length of the tunnels had reached 23 li (1 li = 500 meters), and had connected Jiaozhuanghu with Longwantun, Tangdong and Dabeiwu Village. Soldiers and civilians used them to protect wounded Chinese soldiers, store materials, and shattered enemy’s attacks many times, achieving glorious victories. In November, 1947, the government of Shunyi District awarded Jiaozhuanghu a silk banner that bears “The Greatest Fortress of the People”. After 1949, to commemorate the glories of revolutionaries and inculcate the people with the revolutionary traditions, a museum was set up to show the history of the militia of Jiaozhuanghu. In 1979, the municipal government of Beijing named it “Memorial Museum of Tunnel Warfare Sites at Jiaozhuanghu, Beijing”, and designated it as a major historic site under municipal protection. Since 1987, the municipal government and the district government have allocated funds for restoring an 800-meter-long tunnel, building and altering dozens of kilometers of roads, and purchased and restored 40 houses involved in the war.

In September, 2004, a new memorial museum of tunnel warfare sites started to be built, which covers an area of 7,260 square meters, with a 2,000-square-meter floor space. It includes restoring blockhouses against the enemy. It officially opened in August 2005. The museum displays evidences of the atrocities of Japanese soldiers and quislings, the glorious achievements of local soldiers and civilians fighting against them, the formation of the tunnels and their features.

Map

Take Bus No. 916 to Subway Houshayu, and get on Bus No. Shun 31 to Jiaozhuanghu Station.

Miaofengshan Scenic Area is more than 50 kilometers away from the city center and covers 20 square meters. Miaofengshan Scenic Area is famous for its ancient temples, strangely-shaped pines and rocks. Miaofengshan is a part of Taihang Mountain and consists of igneous rock.

Features: Visitors can appreciate different sightseeing here in Miaofengshan during different seasons. You can enjoy the peach flowers in spring, roses in summer, maple in autumn and snow in winter. The highlight or the most valuable asset of Miao Feng Shan is the Miao Feng Shan Goddess Temple, or locally referred to as Niang Niang Miao (娘娘庙). The Goddess Temple at Miao Feng Shan is dedicated to Bixia Yuanjun (碧霞元君), also known as the “Heavenly Jade Maiden” (天仙玉女) or the “Empress of Mount Tai” (泰山娘娘). According to one of the legends, she is the daughter of the Emperor Lord of Mount Tai. Statues of Bixia Yuanjun often depict her holding a tablet with the Big Dipper as a symbol of her authority. Bixia Yuanjun has given Mt. Miao Feng Shan a reputation in the entire China. The legend has it that the pilgrims come to have their petitions before their goddess, the lame can be made to walk, the ill can be cured, prosperity can be brought to merchants, and longed for children can be given. For every year from the first to fifteenth of the “fourth month” of the Chinese lunar calendar, there is a pilgrimage. During these 15 days, a great number of pilgrims flock to the shrine in the temple. There is a direct tar-road leading to the temple. Most of the pilgrims hike along the ancient pilgrimage trail to the Miao Feng Shan Goddess Temple. Some sources say that the daily pilgrimage volume reaches over five hundred thousand. The pilgrimage at Miao Feng Shan can be dated back to 1629 in the late Ming Dynasty (1368 – 1644). The Miao Feng Shan Temple was built in Yuan Dynasty (1279 – 1368) when the Yuan built Beijing. The pilgrimage was halted both during the Anti-Japanese War (1937 – 1945) and Cultural Revolution (1966 – 1976). The pilgrims are not just from Beijing, they also come from Tianjin, Shanghai and other parts of China. Simultaneously due to mountain Xiongjun, Wufeng, Myoko formations, it is also known as a wonderful peak. Verdant forests, mountains, beautiful scenery, ancient multi temples, sunrise, sunset, rime, Hill Miaofengshan scenic area is located in the territory of more than 50 kilometers from the city center, an area of 20 square kilometers. The scenic spot is famous for its ancient temples, pines, and rocks. The Miaofengshan Taihang Mountains, igneous rock structure, the main peak of 1,291 meters above sea level, and the mountain Qiaoba Elegant flowers can be found here. Miaofengshan scenic area is located in the territory of more than 50 kilometers from the city center, an area of 20 square kilometers, the scenic spot is famous for its ancient temples, pines, rocks.

Take Bus No. 336, 326 at subway station Pingguoyuan to Hetan station and make a transfer for a middle bus to Miaofengshan.

Beijing Qinglonghu Park (北京青龙湖公园 Beijing Green Dragon Park) which is located about 20 kilometers from Beijing, is easily reached via both public and private transportation. The park has been included in the huge area of Qinglonghu (Green Dragon Lake) into the scenic area and is well known with the clearest water around Beijing. Fresh air, lush greenery, picturesque scenery as well as tall mountains have made up the beautiful images of the park. It was awarded the “Beijing First Class Park” in 2002.

Features: The bathing beach is a European style open air bathing area and the pool is designed in a three-level shape and separated into the shallow, middle and deep pools. Thus, the water automatically flows from up to down and forms a three-level flow of streams. In addition, there are many water amusement activities available here such as parachuting, water scooter, self-driving boats and etc. Water sports are not everything that Beijing Qinglonghu Park can offer. There is an orchard which made up by over 30 species of trees and more than 70 types of fruits. From June to November especially during the fruit ripping season, fruit picking activity will be conducted here and all tourists are welcome to enjoy the happiness of farming. Moreover, there are also unique country villas available for tourists who wish to stay overnight here. The restaurant is able to accommodate 300 persons at a time. BBQ, fireworks, and camping are some favorite activities that take place when night falls. The whole area of the park is very large and is especially very suitable for group activities. Since its opening, the park has managed to successfully organize Dragon Boat competitions, Group Sports, Kite Contests as well as some unique contests within this park.

Take bus No. 321, 983, 339, 458, 459 at Liuliqiao station to Nangong and then make a transfer to No. 978 to Qinglonghu Park.