China The Long Coridor, Summer Palace, Beijing

The long Corridor is located in the south of Longevity Hill, facing Kunming Lake. It is east to on the Yaoyue Door and west to Shizhang Pavilion with these magnificently decorated beams and walls.

Much of the palace was looted and burnt by the British during the opium wars (British insisted on paying for tea with opium which the Chinese authorities definitely didn’t want, but the British treasury has almost run out of gold because of the appetite for tea, hence…). Empress Dowager rebuilt it (her solid marble boat is also here in the palace) but it was again trashed by western troops in response to the Boxer rebellion around 1900. What you see now was built in the mid-1900s, hence the still-vibrant paintwork.

A short Taxi ride from Beijing.

Hint: Avoid taking small blonde, blue-eyed, daughters with you to places like this: all local tourists will want their photograph taken with them.