Tianjin Cruise Port: Tianjin City Highlights Shore Excursion

The Porcelain House is a priceless building decorated with 4,000 pieces of ancient porcelain, 400 pieces of jade stone carving, 20 tons of crystal and agate and million pieces of ancient Chinese ceramic chips.

It is located in a bustling area, close to the former residence of an instigator of the Xi'an incident and a patriotic hero in China. Originally a 100-year-old French style villa, the residence is a five-storied building with a total area of 3000 square meters.

On the roof of the house is embedded a 768-meter-long dragon relief made by over ten thousand pieces of porcelain and an eye-catching English word, 'China Dream', with Chinese characters and the flag of China on both sides. Inside the house there are many famous paintings comprised by ceramic chips, including the world famous painting, Mona Lisa. Besides, the walls of the house are named the 'peace wall', consisting of 635 vases made during Republic China and the late Qing Dynasty.

Located on the west bank of Hai River, in the north-eastern corner of Nankai District, Tianjin Ancient Culture Street is a commercial pedestrian street. In ancient times, this was the place where people worshipped the Goddess of the Sea and boatmen had happy get-togethers.

Tianjin Ancient Culture Street is a street consisting of small booths or shops which are modeled after the small folk shops from the Qing Dynasty. There are about 100 shops in the street. All of them have Qing-styled architecture. Colored pictures decorate the doors or windows. These pictures are mainly concerned with history, mythology, figures, birds and flowers. They are openwork, relief sculptures or circular engravings.

The street mainly specializes in three kinds of commodities. The first are cultural relics, antiques and old furniture. The second are traditional folk commodities, such as baby dolls, painted clay sculptures of Clay Figure Zhang. The third are restaurants, tea houses and entertainment venues.

The Museum is located at the center of Tianjin's famous historical building block "Wudadao". It was founded in 2002 by the Tianjin Historical and Cultural administration.

The exhibition hall of the Museum covers an area of 1000 square meters. It displays and collects over 1000 historical photos and precious ancient materials. It has records covering more than 400 years of Sino-foreign relations from mid-16th century to the mid-20th century, involving more than 10 countries such as the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Canada and exhibits more than 400 new photos.

Its permanent exhibition includes Tianjin-An Epitome of Modern China-Hundreds of China's First, Tianjin in Western History Paintings, Engraved 1900 and Western Historical and Cultural Notes, representing the history of Tianjin from a unique perspective and tracing back to the pace of modernization that led the trend in China more than 100 years ago.

Tianjin Eye is a 125-meters tall giant Ferris wheel built above the Yongle Bridge, which is claimed to be the only such wheel to have been constructed over a bridge. During the daytime the wheel has an almost industrial feel to its stark white steel construction, and the reflection of the wheel in the river just show the display doubly impressive.

Tianjin Eye is electrically powered and has 48 passenger capsules, each able to carry 8 passengers, and takes 25 minutes to complete a rotation, giving a maximum capacity of 768 passengers per hour.

Except for riding Ferris wheel, looking at Tianjin Eye from afar and taking photos are also good choices. This Ferris wheel is like an eye when looking from afar and this is how Tianjin Eye is named.