Discover Guilin and Yangshuo
Seven Star Park
七星公园
Guilin's largest park, holding the Seven Star Cave, Camel Hill, a zoo with pandas and the Song dynasty Flower Bridge, plus Tang and Song rock inscriptions. It is where Guilin residents actually spend their weekends.
The story
What makes this place special
Seven Star Park is the largest park in central Guilin, on the east bank of the Li beside the Little East River, around a kilometre and a half from the centre, and covering roughly 135 hectares. It takes its name from seven peaks arranged in a pattern read as the Big Dipper - four on Putuo Hill and three on Crescent Hill. It holds two of Guilin's classical Eight Views; Seven Star Cave was known as a scenic cave centuries ago and the Ming traveller Xu Xiake visited it twice. The Longyin cave and the Guihai stele forest beside it hold a major collection of carved stone inscriptions, gathered from across Guilin, enough that it is described as the southern counterpart to Xi'an's stele forest.
What you’ll discover
A big urban park with several distinct things in it: Seven Star Cave, a lit limestone cave about 1,100 metres long inside Putuo Hill, entered on timed guided groups; Camel Hill, a karst outcrop shaped like a kneeling camel that is Guilin's second civic emblem; the Longyin cave with the river running through its lower chamber and the Guihai stele forest of ancient carved tablets and stone archways along the path; Flower Bridge, a Song covered bridge about 135 metres long with azaleas around it in spring; plus gardens, a zoo and open lawns.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- Go for the stele forest, which is the serious thing here and is almost always empty. Several hundred carved inscriptions from the Tang onward, including political satire and official notices, gathered in and around Longyin cave - it is the best historical collection in Guilin and the groups all go to the cave instead.
- The cave is entered in batches with a guide, roughly every half hour, so you cannot simply walk in - if you are on a schedule, do the cave first.
- If you are also doing Reed Flute Cave, do not do both caves. They are the same coloured-lighting experience and Seven Star Cave is longer.
- The park is large and the sights are spread out across it; take the internal route map at the gate seriously or you will walk a long way by accident.
- Camel Hill is best from the lawn to its south-east, where the shape reads properly, and it is free of the souvenir pressure at Elephant Trunk Hill.
When to come
Morning, both for the cave groups and for the park. Spring for the azaleas around Flower Bridge. It is an urban park with long opening hours in summer, so a late-afternoon visit works too.
Getting around
Partly good. The park's roads and main paths are broad, paved and largely level, so a wheelchair user can see Camel Hill, Flower Bridge and the gardens, and the distances are the main difficulty. The cave has steps and uneven wet floors inside, Longyin cave and the stele paths involve steps, and the hill paths climb. Flower Bridge itself is a gentle arch. Expect a partial visit in a wheelchair and an easy one with a bad knee if you keep to the flat.
Worth knowing before you go
If you have already done Reed Flute Cave you can skip the Seven Star Cave and just pay the park entry for the Flower Bridge and the rock-inscription cliffs.
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