Hong Kong (CNN) — This summer vacation, some of the world’s most influential people will be soaking up the sun in Saint-Tropez before cruising up the coast to Monaco.
But you won’t find China’s political elite sipping Champagne on a superyacht.
Every summer, they secretly retreat to Beidaihe, a humble seaside town frequented by crowds of ordinary Chinese families, around 186 miles (300 kilometers) east of Beijing, that’s long been a haven for Communist Party leaders.
The annual leaders’ vacation is cloaked in mystery — it’s not known exactly which day they’ll descend on the town, but security starts tightening in early July. Drones are banned, and visitors are not allowed to take hot air balloon rides or private trips on boats around the coast.
Then, sometime in the beginning of August, as if on cue, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and some of his closest aides disappear from public view.
No announcements are made but public records show that China’s top leaders tend to take a break in August that lasts around 10 to 14 days. During this time, they don’t typically appear in public except in matters of national urgency, like natural disasters.
The town is a fitting destination for a leader who’s made it his personal mission to eliminate corruption within all levels of Chinese government. Beidaihe is dotted with gray Soviet style villas, many bearing signs painted in red and carrying names like “workers’ sanatorium.”
Pebble paths wind through the town, leading visitors to a coastline of soft, golden sand. Umbrellas dot the beach, and neon-lit restaurants serve fresh seafood to guests perched on simple plastic white chairs.
Rana Mitter, a prominent modern China historian, told CNN that the understated destination speaks to Xi’s wider message that an individual should have humility in understanding their wider role within the party.
“They don’t want to look like they’re going to any kind of fancy place where corruption might be possible,” said Mitter.
“Going to a very traditional, quite humble resort is a good way of symbolizing that, while going to a five-star hotel in Hainan or some international hotel in the Caribbean wouldn’t really have that effect.”
A very mysterious summer retreat
Beidaihe is a fascinating window into the history of the party’s leadership and China’s past, and its low-key appearance belies its popularity, which sees around 50 million domestic tourists visit each year.
Standing in the sea, which may feel chilly even during the summer, visitors can catch a glimpse of Shanhai Pass, the historic fortified gateway that marks the eastern end of the Great Wall. But what most won’t see is any sign of the country’s leaders.
The party’s annual summer retreat to Beidaihe dates back to 1953, when communist China’s founding father Mao Zedong chose the seaside town as a summer workplace for top leaders.
Mao was known to love open-sea swimming. Back then, air conditioning was non-existent and even fans were a rarity in Beijing’s sweltering summers.
Due to its proximity to the capital, Beidaihe became an ideal location for Chinese leaders to set the political agenda during a quieter time in their calendar.
One of the most important events in China’s recent history was the Beidaihe meeting in 1958, during which Mao decided to mobilize the entire country to pursue increasing production targets, according to Mitter, the historian. The meeting eventually led to the disaster of the Great Leap Forward, which caused the death of millions from famine due to poor economic planning.
Retreats to Beidaihe were put on pause during the subsequent decade-long Cultural Revolution before eventually resuming following Mao’s death in 1976. Deng Xiaoping, China’s post-Mao paramount leader, was known for taking his family on vacation to the town. Deng also opened Beidaihe to foreign tourists in the 1980s as China was hungry for foreign currency.
Beidaihe’s role in China’s elite politics has since evolved. During a period of economic reform in the early 2000s, leaders avoided being seen taking vacations, Mitter said.
“Then the Xi Jinping era, it’s much more mysterious, like many things under Xi Jinping. (We) don’t know, but there seems to be some consensus that there are meetings year by year,” he added.
Every year, Xi’s chief of staff Cai Qi hosts more than three dozen of China’s most prominent academics in Beidaihe to discuss national priorities like AI.
The timing is considered a clue as to when Xi and other senior leaders will take their own summer break. Many officials also take advantage of the chance to travel or take time off when the bosses are away, according to people familiar with the matter.
As Xi continues to tighten his grip over the party and nation, Beidaihe’s role in Chinese political power play has greatly diminished in recent years — though public imagination of seaside palace intrigue lives on.
A history of holidaying power brokers
Beidaihe has long been associated with power. According to historical records, China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, passed through the area in 221 BC when he was searching for a mythical island where immortals were said to possess the elixir of eternal life.
It transformed into a modern destination in 1898, when the Qing government opened nearby Qinhuangdao as a treaty port and officially designated Beidaihe as a summer retreat where Chinese and foreigners were permitted to live side by side. The first travel guidebook about Beidaihe appeared in 1921.
As the resort’s reputation grew, it became a favored retreat for the political elite. In the early 20th Century, senior officials from the then-ruling Kuomintang leadership and foreign diplomats to China built summer villas along its coastline.
After the Communists won the Chinese civil war in 1949, party leadership took over vacant villas, and established sanatoriums for wounded soldiers and retreat centers for senior leaders.
Mao was known to have occupied Villas No.1 and 99. He’s said to have liked Beidaihe so much that he often stayed longer than planned, prompting other senior leaders and government officials to follow his lead.
Among Beidaihe’s many secluded villas is the former summer home of Lin Biao, the military marshal who rose to become Mao’s onetime chosen heir. He allegedly fled from Villa No.96 in Beidaihe after he failed to overthrow Mao, then was killed in a plane crash in 1971. The real reason for his death continues to haunt historians to this day.
Mao famously wrote a poem called “Langtaosha: Beidaihe” (“Waves wash away the sand: Beidaihe”) while on vacation in the town. The poem opens with vivid images of towering white waves and a vast sea so stormy that even fishing boats disappear from view.
It reflects China’s history from the era of its first emperor to the present, and the use of the turbulent sea is seen as a powerful metaphor for the sweeping changes of time and the transformation of the nation.
‘A big contradiction’
Johnny Erling, a retired German journalist who has worked in China for around four decades, told CNN that he has visited Beidaihe many times from the 1980s to 2019 to understand more about China’s political elite.
“China’s politics is a big black box and Beidaihe is one of the symbolic names for that. Because nobody knows exactly what’s really going on, but everyone knows something,” he said.
During his many visits to Beidaihe, he said he was warned by police to stay away.
“The police knew that I was going to go from telephone and hotel reservations… they were asking me not to go… and I did,” he said. “When I went there in 2018, the police were already on the beach, pretending they are just bathing.”
Erling said when he approached the area believed to host the leadership compound years ago, security “tensed up.”
“Everywhere I saw these security guys talking into walkie-talkies: “Foreigner is coming! Foreigner is coming!”
“They have to look at everything. It is really serious. But on the other side, they have to keep this as a holiday resort, so it’s a big contradiction,” he said.
While not considered to have one of Asia’s most spectacular coastlines, Beidaihe’s appeal lies in its unique blend of history, local culture and seaside scenery.
Beidaihe’s location in northern China also makes it a popular destination for Russian travelers; tourism figures show some 50,000 Russians visit each year.
One Russian expat working in China told CNN that he found Beidaihe a “pretty nice place, the only issue is that the sea is a bit shallow.”
“Sea, sun and food — that’s what we are after.”
James Zimmerman, an American who has lived and worked in China as a lawyer since the 1990s, told CNN that he had “a very long day trip” to Beidaihe 20 years ago.
“I was driving four hours one way. My time there was to walk the beach, walk the ‘town’ and see old European-style buildings, have dinner and then drive home to Beijing.”
“Of course, the beaches of California, Southern France, and Thailand are much nicer year-round, but this was a nice accessible beach resort in the summer months back in the early 20th century — especially before air travel and high-speed trains.”
Beijing resident Wang Jiang has been to Beidaihe several times since he was a kid in the early 2000s and has witnessed the town’s transformation.
“If someone said, ‘I’m off to Hainan for vacation,’ that may secretly draw many resentments from other colleagues as everyone feels exhausted from work,” he said, of the southern coastal region known as China’s “Hawaii.”
“But if they say ‘I’m going to Beidaihe — with my laptop. I’ll still be working, and if anything comes up, you can reach me there,’ it creates a very different impression.”
Wang has made solo trips to Beidaihe in recent years for the theater festival in nearby Aranya, a seaside development that’s evolved into one of China’s most influential lifestyle destinations.
Popular with young Chinese vacationers, Aranya is known for its avant-garde buildings, including a chapel on the beach, and attracts artists, architects, and entrepreneurs.
Wang told CNN that Beidaihe offers visitors different layers of access and privilege.
“The true ‘first class’ is, without question, the highly private areas reserved for senior government officials to vacation. That’s a completely separate system. Then there’s what you might call the ordinary first class — places like Aranya. And beyond that, there’s an even more ordinary ‘third class.’
“Overall I think its association (with the party) has faded over time. In the past, people might have thought about those historical connections, but nowadays most people simply see it as a place to relax.”
CNN’s Sonya King and Shuai Zhang contributed reporting.
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