Nanjing City, Jiangsu, China

7. Zhonghua Gate

Some of the original 13 Ming city gates remain, including Heping Gate (heping men) in the north and Zhonghua Gate (zhonghua men) in the south. The city gates were heavily fortified and, rather than being weak points of the defenses, they were defensive strongholds. The Zhonghua Gate has four rows of gates, making it almost impregnable; it could house a garrison of 3,000 soldiers in vaults in the front building. Today some of these vaults are used as souvenir shops. Zhonghua Gate can be visited, but Heping Gate is now used as a barracks. We thought the gates to be impressive.