Yuyuan Garden, Shanghai

YuYuan Gardens in Shanghai, China is one of the most fantastic sites in Shanghai, and one of the most famous gardens in all China. Aparently they were built in 1559 as a private garden. Today they are completely public and surrounded by a huge tourism-industry that caters foreigners as well as locals. If you come here on a weekend with nice weather, there are masses of people tha you do not want to have while walking there.

The garden is surrounded by a line of buildings in the same style as the pavillions inside, just larger (and new). They host a vast array of shops where you can buy some nice things and a lot of rubbish. Once you go inside, you can stroll between the shops and will see most of the same kind of good everywhere. There is also a pond and some bridges inbetween that make a nice scenery once you get the second where nobody is standing in front of you. Then, when you enter the inner garden (you have to pay), you will see the old buildings and the ponds below them, as well as the famous roof ornaments and stones that are the main charachteristic of the place.
There are small paths between the plants and houses that are fortunately locked off from the public, so your imagination at least can get a glimpse of what it might have been like to stroll around here just by yourself instead of in a mass of people. The pavillions host pictures, artwork and descriptions of the use, architecture and historic information.
Several walls are ornamented with dragon heads and the tail of the dragon is ondulating over the whole walls length in a detailed, see-through pattern.
There are so many roof ornaments of tigers, lions, dragaons, fighters, monks and monsters that you do not know where to look first. You better bring a binocular to take a close look at them since the detail is extraordinary.
The buildings are connected with bridges, sometimtes separated by walls and served as tea houses, opera stages etc etc.
Many of the statues are known by type but are in a special style from the era the garden was built. All of them are symbolic and usually bring good luck or protect from bad influences.