Forbidden City Photos

As promised in my previous post, here are photos from the Forbidden City.

Here's the first hint that the day was going to be ridiculously crowded.

It really was beautiful, despite umbrellas and crowds.

In Chinese architecture, the importance of a building is judged by the number of animals on the eaves. This building has 10 between the large dragon head at the back and the Buddha in the front, meaning this building is at the most important level.

Just a glimpse of how impossible it was to see anything of importance.

Some things have been incredibly well preserved, and I was very impressed.

Notice the difference in preservation of these two columns. One is still very detailed, the other almost smooth. I started paying attention to the degradation of some parts of the "city."

This eave hasn't been restored like most of the rest of them.

There was a small park at the back of the "city," and there were trees in the park that were so old they needed to be held up with huge poles. Some of the threes there are more than 300 years old.