Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre

Head to the memorial hall in the morning to try to skip the crowds. There are free docent tours a few times a day, so it can be informative to join one of those. Or, there are plenty of organized tours that visit the memorial hall. Private tours provide a personal tour guide to take you through the area at your own pace. Often, day tours heading to the memorial hall include other stops in Nanjing, such as Meiling Palace or Qiqiao Village.

• Free strollers and wheelchairs are available to borrow during your visit to the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre.

• Small bags are allowed into the exhibition hall, but larger items must be stored for a small fee.

• Be careful when taking pictures as there are strict regulations about what can and can’t be photographed at the sites.

Line 2 of Nanjing’s subway takes you to Yunjin Lu. Get off here and take the second exit. You can’t miss the gray marble museum with serious looking statues outside. Enter through Gate 1, complete your tour of the memorial hall, and exit at Gate 2, which will take you back to the subway. Several public buses also run to the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre.

To avoid crowds as much as possible, aim for weekday mornings, but that’s also not a guarantee. The memorial hall is open Tuesday through Sunday from around 8:30am to 4:30pm. It’s open on Mondays if they are also public holidays, and entrance is free. Plan on spending a few hours to see the entire facility.

For a little lighter topic than the Nanjing Massacre, head over to the Nanjing Silk Brocade Museum (China Nanjing Yunjin Museum) after your visit to the memorial hall, which is more or less right across the street. Check out silk tapestries more than 1,600 years old of all sorts of intricate patterns and styles. It’s free, and open from around 8am-5:30pm, so it can pair nicely with a visit to the memorial hall.