Discover Kunming
Dianchi Lake and Haigeng Dam
滇池与海埂大坝
Yunnan's largest lake sits on Kunming's southwestern edge with the Western Hills opposite. Haigeng Dam is the long lakeside promenade where, from November to March, tens of thousands of red-billed gulls that migrate from Siberia are fed by hand.
The story
What makes this place special
Dianchi is Yunnan's largest highland lake and China's sixth largest freshwater lake, at about 1,886m, with a current surface of roughly 290 to 310 square kilometres; it has shrunk from around 500 square kilometres in the early nineteenth century and 338 square kilometres in 1938. Silt built up a bank, the Haigeng dam, which divides the small northern Caohai from the much larger Outer Lake, and the Xiyuan tunnel completed in 1996 drains Caohai separately, so the two are now effectively separate bodies of water. Industry around Kunming and farmland reclamation from the 1970s produced severe eutrophication, with blue-green algal blooms and summer water hyacinth. Quality improved after the 2007-2011 clean-up programme and the lake held Grade IV for a full year in 2018, but the water is still not drinkable; a central environmental inspection in 2021 found property developments encroaching on the shore and ordered on-site supervision of the clean-up.
What you’ll discover
Haigeng dam is a long causeway and promenade with the lake on both sides, the Western Hills rising across the water, and in winter gulls strung along the whole length of it. Behind it is Haigeng Park with lawns and lakeside paths, and beyond that the Yunnan Nationalities Village and the lower station of the cableway that crosses the water to the Western Hills. The water is often green and sometimes scummy in late summer, which is worth knowing before you plan a lakeside day in August.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- The Haigeng promenade in winter is the gull experience at scale, with far more space than Green Lake Park and the mountain opposite as the backdrop. It is free, and most visitors go to Cuihu instead.
- Take the cableway from Haigeng across the lake to the Western Hills. It is the only way to see Dianchi from the air, it saves the road journey round, and it links two sights into one half day.
- Avoid the lake edge in late summer if you are sensitive to smell. Algal bloom and water hyacinth accumulate on the lee shore in August and September and the water quality is still only moderate.
- Do not plan on swimming or on eating lake fish casually. The lake is under protection rules and the water is not of drinking quality.
- The lake is big and the interesting edges are far apart. Pick one shore: Haigeng and the Western Hills on the north and west, or Haikou and the Jincheng side for quiet. Trying to circle it in a day is wasted driving.
When to come
December to February, for gulls, clear air and the best views across to the Western Hills. Mornings are calmest; afternoon wind gets up on the causeway. Late summer is the least appealing for water quality.
Getting around
Very good. The Haigeng dam promenade and Haigeng Park are flat, wide, paved and purpose-built for strolling, with benches, and a wheelchair can use the full length. The cableway boards on the level. A bad knee is no obstacle.
Worth knowing before you go
The gulls arrive around the start of November and leave in March — outside that window the dam is simply a windy promenade. It also connects by cable car across the water to the Western Hills.
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