7 Days in Chaoyang

The 42.6-metre North Pagoda stacks five eras — a Liao brick body of the 1040s over Northern Wei, Sui and Tang predecessors, on foundations of Longcheng, the Yan capital founded in 341; the museum keeps the 1988 hoard from the pagoda's 'heaven chamber'.

1. chaoyang north pagoda
2. chaoyang north pagoda museum
3. chaoyang south pagoda

Slabs in the quarry section preserve a 120-million-year-old lake world of early birds, feathered dinosaurs and fish; the 1996 Sinosauropteryx find here made paleontology history.

1. chaoyang bird fossil park

A 90-minute drive west, the park protects a Hongshan culture ritual complex some 5,500 years old — goddess temple, stone-pile tombs and jade pig-dragons in the on-site museum; stay in Lingyuan town that night, ten minutes closer to the springs.

1. chaoyang niuheliang site

The Reshuitang thermal village northwest of Lingyuan has drawn bathers for centuries along the old road west; a slow soak day between site visits, with valley walks among the walnut orchards.

1. chaoyang reshuitang hot spring

The Dongshanzui altar (excavated from 1979) belongs to the same 5,000-year-old Hongshan world as Niuheliang, and Pigeon Cave above the Daling river holds a Palaeolithic occupation at least some 50,000 years old.

1. chaoyang dongshanzui site
2. chaoyang gezi cave

Granite peaks and pines east of Beipiao town — locals call the hill the 'little Huangshan of western Liaoning'; stairways and loop trails take three to four hours, with the whole Daling plain below.

1. chaoyang dahei mountain

Temple terraces and a Liao-era pagoda on the hill east of the city make an easy final half-day; the HSR link opened in January 2021 runs to Beijing in about two hours, with Jinzhou just over half an hour.

1. chaoyang phoenix mountain