National Museum Of China, Beijing

It's a good museum and not too overwhelming, despite the awe-inspiring size of the place. It's very airy and the exhibits are limited and tightly focused. It's got a good mix of various things, although each individual exhibit isn't really tied to any of the others through any thematic link. I enjoyed the jade exhibit and the wood-carving exhibit, and some of the ceramics were most impressive. The staff speaks a decent amount of English, but be warned, you're going to need your passport to get in.

Huge museum, and very crowded. We queued for about 30 minutes in a very unruly line before being able to enter. You have to have your passport, as with everything in China, and the museum entry is free. No maps are available in English, and not all exhibitions have English descriptions. The basement (B1) has the Ancient China exhibition - very informative, with a lot of artifacts. We liked the room where they display presents from other governments to the Chinese government which was on the fourth floor.