Fragrant Hills Park （East Gate 2）

This guide to Fragrant Hills Park's East Gate in Beijing follows one hillside garden through very different lives: a Ming-era imperial escape from summer heat, a retreat lavished with pavilions by Qianlong in 1745, twice burned by foreign armies, and for a few months in 1949 the secret headquarters where Mao Zedong and the Communist Party worked from a modest villa called Shuangqing. Look for that villa tucked into the slopes past the maples as you walk.