Beijing Zoo

Beijing Zoo is called Běi jīng dòng wù yuán in Chinese.

Beijing Zoo was opened to tourists in 1908 and at that time it was called the ten thousand animals garden. It is located about a 20 minute walk west of the metro station Xizhimen on the Loop line.

The zoo was originally the emperor’s estate in the Ming dynasty but there were no animals there at that time. During the Qing dynasty they began to grow plants and breed different animals. It got the current name “zoo” in 1955.

The Beijing Zoo has mostly wild Chinese domestic animals, such as the panda. There are also a number of animals from around the world such as the polar bear, kangaroo and zebra.

There are 30 large halls and a lot of smaller buildings. The zoo has 600 animal species and a total of 7000 animals.

Inside the zoo, there is also an aquarium, the largest one in China. It opened in 1999 and has a large amount of fish but also dolphins. Here you can enjoy the world class dolphins performance.

The zoo is very large and it is difficult to see everything in one day. It is cheap to enter so you can also go there just to walk around and relax for a while. The whole park is very nice and even if you do not like to look at the animals, you will enjoy being inside. There are also a lot of buildings preserved from the Qing dynasty inside the area.