6 Places to Visit in Beijing in January

For most visitors, the first thing to do in Beijing in January is to go skating over the outdoor icy lakes. Among them, Kunming Lake in Summer Palace is the best pot. This place is considered to be the largest natural skating rink in Beijing, which is as large as 98 football fields. You can heartily experience lots of ice entertainments here, such as ice bicycle, ice bumper car, electrical ice boat, ice slide and of course speed skating. Interestingly, record has it that the ice entertainments in Beijing can be traced back to Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). In recent years, in order to welcome the Olympic Winter Games held in Beijing in 2022, these ice events have been greatly developed. In addition, tourists can also feast their eyes on the winter scenery of Summer Palace, and this imperial garden is the most beautiful in the misty sunset.

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When visiting Beijing in January, Longqing Gorge is another must. This place holds ice lantern festival every winter, which is one of the top things to do in Beijing in January. Tourists will be impressed with its amazing combination of winter landscape and modern artistic techniques. Though the theme of the festival changes every year, the spectacular ice waterfall of 70 meters (230 feet) high is always here for you. Accompanied with frost flowers and numerous icicles, this place is trully a paradise of ice and snow. Also exhibited are the ice lights, ice carvings and snow carvings in various shapes and sizes, which will bring you an immersive experience of a winter tour. The best time to come here is at night. Even when viewing Longqing Gorge from a distance, you will find that hundreds of flower lights and tree lights are glittering with dazzling colors, outlining the pavillions and mountains.

Everyone knows that Bird’s Nest is a famous international stadium. However, if you travel to Beijing in January, you will be surprised that this place also provides many ice and snow entertainments for public. More than twenty events are designed from Winter Olympic Games, including ski jumping, cross-country skiing, snowboarding, balance bike, snow soccer, and so forth! The ski area is rather ample that can enable 500 people use elementary slope and magic carpet at the same time. There is also a gigantic snow castle, in which children can climb snow hills and burrow snow holes. Besides, thousands of ice chunks are built in the shape of an island, and this interactive area must be children’s favorite.

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Best places to visit in Beijing in January should include the ski resorts. Nanshan Ski Resort is the largest ski resort in north China, and is well-known for the good quality of powder snow with few hard ice layers. Its another competitive edge is advanced and diversified skiing facilities. Tourists can enjoy the convenience of 3 cables, 6 magic carpets, 25 ski slopes for elementary, intermediate, high-level, teaching and entertainemnt use. Quiksilve Park in Nanshan Ski Resort is the first snowboarding area in China and has considerable popularity among skiers. If you are just a beginner of skiing or want to learn more complicate moves, professional coachers are always stand by! You can also try other snow entertainments here like sledding and snow saucer. It can’t feel better when you rush forward with wind blowing against your face. This place also holds ski fashion party at irregular times, where you can discover the most stylish ski outfits and most advanced ski equipment.

In addition to the activities related to ice and snow, what to do in Beijing in January? The answer must be a comfortable hot spring bath. Longmai Resort features with various types of hot springs. Tourists will be definitely refreshed by hyperthermal bath, sand bath, Chinese herbs bath, salt spring, good-smelling bath, bubble bath, steam sauna, dry sauna, and so on. Here also provides entertainment events like hot spring surfing and drifting. In-door hot spring swimming pool is worth trying as well. Leisure facilities like net bar and movie zone will greatly level up your vacation experience.

Double Dragon Gorge has a very dense cluster of waterfalls. When winter comes, hundreds of waterfalls begin to froze, forming a breathtaking scenery and wining Double Dragon Gorge the reputation “a top place to visit in Beijing in January”. The hottest attraction is a gigantic ice waterfall of 40 meters (131 feet) high and 15 (50 feet) meters wide, which bears a striking resemblance with a silver dragon. When walking through the valley, you can find frost flowers and grotesque icicles scattered everywhere. If you are good at sports, you can ask for the ice chisel and crampon to closely discover the beauty of this natural palace.