Fragrant Hills (Xiangshan)

Forested hills in the northwest suburbs. Famous for the maple-and-smoke-tree autumn leaves; cable car to the summit.

Fragrant Hills sits 28 km northwest of central Beijing. The 557m summit is reached by hiking trails or cable car. Imperial-era pavilions, the Temple of the Azure Clouds, and the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall (where his coffin lay temporarily in 1925) are scattered through the park. The peak attraction is the late-October to mid-November red-leaf season — Beijing's most-photographed autumn landscape, drawing huge crowds.