Beihai Park remains one of my favorite places to visit in Beijing; it continues to amaze me that more tourist groups don’t come here, given its beauty and its location right next to the Forbidden City.  My previous visit to Beihai Park took me around the northern and western edges of Beihai Lake, which makes up most of the park; my trip this early spring day was to Jade Islet at the center of the lake, starting from the park’s south entrance.  The White Dagoba, the centerpiece of Beihai Park shown here, sits atop Jade Islet.  The marble bridge in the foreground was constructed in the 13th century, during the Yuan dynasty; at that time, Kublai Khan had a palace atop Jade Islet.  The dagoba was built in the same location some four hundred years later.

After crossing the bridge north onto the island, visitors beginning the climb to the White Dagoba first encounter the Yong’an Temple (the Temple of Eternal Peace).  Tiles such as this one sit atop the walls on the approach to the temple.

For luck, happiness, wealth, and long life, worshipers tie ornaments to trees in the Yong’an Temple courtyard.  In the background is the entrance to one of the five temple halls, the Hall of the Wheel of Law.  The temple was constructed at the same time as the White Dagoba, in the mid-1600’s, soon after the rise of the Qing dynasty - in fact, many of the structures on Jade Islet were built during the Qing dynasty, though the island’s history stretches back a millenium.  In disrepair much of the past century, the temple reopened just over a decade ago.

Continuing north beyong the temple halls and further up the hill is another Buddhist structure, Shanyin Hall, covered by 445 blue glazed tiles of Buddhas.

Shanyin Hall has a circular roof, representing heaven, above a square foundation, representing earth.  Despite being called a hall, Shanyin has no interior; the structure sits atop red walls with a nondescript archway passing underneath.  The overhang on the left is from the White Dagoba, which is also a purely exterior structure and is best viewed from a distance.

On a clear day, magnificent views can be had from Shanyin Hall atop Jade Islet southeast into the Forbidden City.

Another view of the Shanyin Hall buddhas.

After reaching Shanyin Hall and the White Dagoba, it’s downhill to the lake.  This is the walkway along the northern edge of Jade Islet, looking northeast across Beihai Lake to the red Painted Boat Studio in the distance.  Along this walkway is a long corridor - good for shade, but not as impressive as the corridor at the Summer Palace - as well as a restaurant serving dishes favored by Empress Dowager Cixi a century ago and a dock with boats taking visitors across the lake to the northern reaches of Beihai Park.

I decided to take one of those boats north across Beihai Lake to photograph the Iron Screen Wall, an object I had neglected on my previous visit to the northern section of the park.  Despite its rusty color, it’s not iron, or even iron ore; it’s a lava fragment.

Detail of a lion cub on the Iron Screen Wall.  The carvings were created during the Yuan dynasty around the same time as the marble bridge shown earlier.  However, this screen did not originate at Beihai Park; it was brought here in 1948.

Another detail of the wall carvings in the late afternoon sun.  Europe was going through the Middle Ages when this artwork was created in China.

A final view of the White Dagoba atop Jade Islet, with Shanyin Hall in front of it.  That canopy on top of the dagoba is made of copper and holds fourteen copper bells.  Many structures in Beihai Park today were reconstructed after man-made damage, from foreign invasion and the Cultural Revolution; the dagoba was reconstructed after natural damage, from a number of earthquakes over the centuries.  The entire park is in fine shape these days, and well worth a visit, even for first-time visitors to Beijing.