Entering the Imperial Palace in Shenyang 沈阳故宫

The Imperial Palace in Shenyang is no doubt the city’s number one attraction. It is a miniature version of the Forbidden city found in the Beijing. Not really a surprise since the Qing dynasty emperors had this built in support of the main palace. The imperial palace in Shenyang was likewise elevated to the UNESCO world heritage site list. Despite this, the palace isn’t the tourist magnet that the Forbidden City is. Yes, this is probably why most people don’t know of this palace except for the Chinese. It was only during my research about Northeast China that I found out that Shenyang also has an Imperial Palace of its own.

However, this is not to say that there are no tourists in Shenyang. Due to the historical nature of the palace this attracts groups of Chinese history afficionados, mostly old men and women in tour groups. There were also present in the palace but not as nerve wracking as the ones from Beijing where there are hordes and hordes of tour groups. I guess that is what was nice about the Imperial Palace here, you don’t have to contend with these hordes to enjoy the park. Already, I was enjoying this fact since there was no queue to enter the palace grounds.

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