City Guide:

Hebei province, with its beautiful capital Shijiazhuang , is called "Ji" for short . It is near Beijing and located to the north of the Yellow River and to the east of the Taihang Mountains . Hebei province covers an area of 1,880,000 square kilometers, and is inhabited by a population of 64,840,000, of the Han, Hui, Manchu , Mongolian , and Korea natonalities. Hebei province has jurisdiction over 11 prefecture-level cities, 32 county-level cities, 109 counties and 6 autonomous counties.

Topographically speaking, Hebei province is long and narrow with 43% of the province is less than 100 meters above sea level. Hebei has highly developed agriculture, together with fishery, iron industry and pottery manufacturing. It is rich in mineral resources, such as petroleum, limestone, asbestos, phosphorus, vanadium, platinum and lead, the reserves of which are the most abundant in China . Communications in Hebei province are also very convenient. Mainly, there is railway, highway. water transport and aviation. One of its main cities Qinhuangdao, is a important port of the ocean shipping. It ranks second in China .

The history of Hebei province can be dated back to the Spring and Autumn Period. It was once under the jurisdiction of Yan and Zhao during the period of Spring and Autumn period (770BC-476BC). At that time it was "the land of Yan and Zhao", since its northern part was dominated by the kingdom of Yan , and the southern part was dominated by the kingdom of Zhao . Chengde, another main city in Hebei province is famous for its mountain resort. Because of its long and proud history, Hebei province now boasts a variety of cultural resources. The places of interest include Chengde Mountain Resort in Chengde, Beidaihe Beach and Shanghaiguan in Qinhuangdao and so on. Zhaozhou Bridge was listed as World Cultural Heritage in 1991.