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Photo: Kcx36, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Daguan Park in the western part of Kunming races the Dianchi Lake in the south and the Western Mountains in the west. The pavilion, with a history of more than three hundred years, is a three-floor square structure with flying eaves and golden-lacquered ornamentation. The top floor of the pavilion provides an all-embracing view of the vast Dianchi Lake and the peaks of the Western Mountains. A 180-character couplet is hanging down the pavilion, which is lauded as the number one couplet past and present. The park is the most fascinating garden in urban Kunming.
Daguan Park is a lakeside park located in the southwestern suburb of Kunming, Yunnan, China. Today many locals come to sit, drink tea, fly kites, and go boating. Among shady walks and pools, Daguan's focal point is Daguan Lou, a square, three-storeyed pavilion built to better the Kangxi Emperor's enjoyment of the distant Western Hills and now a storehouse of calligraphy extolling the area's charms. The most famous poem here is a 118-character verse, carved into the gateposts by the Qing dynasty scholar Sun Ran, reputed to be the longest set of rhyming couplets in China. The park is set on Daguan Stream, which flows south into Lake Dian, and there are frequent hour-long cruises down the waterway, lined with willows, to points along Lake Dian's northern shore. Lake Dian, also known as the Kunming Lake, is the largest lake on the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau. At Longmen of the Western Hills, there is a panoramic view of the lake.
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云南美术馆
Occupies the building where the Yunnan Provincial Museum (listed below) used to be.
云南艺术剧院
云南陆军讲武堂旧址
The Yunnan Military Academy is a historic military academy that was founded in 1909 during the final years of the Qing Dynasty. It continued to operate after the Xinhai Revolution (1911) and was one of the most important military academies in China up until its closure in 1935. A number of prominent Communist military leaders received their training here. A museum at the site explains the history. The museum is in three sections with bilingual information boards and artefact labels.
Kunming Walking Tours
Small-group guided walking tour (up to 6 people) through Green Lake (Cuihu) and the old university quarter, focusing on Kunming's history of foreign influence. Covers the French-built Yunnan–Vietnam railway, a poet and professor turned activist Wen Yiduo, and the wartime National Southwestern Associated University (Lianda) where two future Nobel laureates studied. In English. Book via the website.
景星街花鸟市场; Jǐngxīng Jiē Huāniǎo Shìchǎng
If purchasing cute little puppy dogs, live crickets, birds, live bird food, tortoises and other things creepy, crawly and/or fluffy is your thing then it is here to be had... along with a few flowers and a great many trinkets. The most obvious stalls begin where Wuyi Road meets Dongfeng West Road but other sellers can be found on other streets within the district.
抗战胜利纪念堂, 抗战胜利堂, Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall
Completed in 1947, this was one of the first war memorials to be commissioned in China following the end of the Second World War. It is now a national heritage site.