City guide · Hunan
Three thousand sandstone pillars straight out of Avatar, a glass skywalk bolted to a cliff, and a cable car that leaves from downtown.
Reviewed by our Beijing team Updated 2026-10-10
The short version
City guide
Photographs from the coast, and what other travellers wrote afterwards.
When you see the whole range at once, every bit of effort it took to get there feels worth it, because you are not 'as if' standing in a fairyland — you are standing in one. It rained, so the whole of Yuanjiajie was wrapped in cloud, and the cloud moved with the wind, so those towering ridges kept appearing and disappearing. You have to see it yourself to understand.
brant9527, 'Zhangjiajie, a Fairyland in the Rain'
The peaks stood in ranks, fifty-six of them like soldiers, as if they were guarding the place with halberds in hand. It was nearly dusk and the setting sun struck them so they glowed gold. You don't need to say anything — just look at them quietly and you'll feel what it means to be part of nature.
Romantic Traveller 000, 'Zhangjiajie, Fenghuang and Changsha: A Very Practical Guide'
The first thing that hits you in Zhangjiajie is not a view but a scale problem. The pillars rise three or four hundred metres out of the valley floor, packed so tightly that from a viewpoint you cannot count them, and the green haze between them hides where one ridge ends and the next begins. You stand on a platform bolted to a cliff, look down, and the valley floor has vanished into cloud.
This is not a place you see from a coach window. Almost everything worthwhile here is reached on foot, up and down carved stone staircases, and the park is deliberately spread out so that a single day only touches one corner of it. The reward is that the crowds thin the moment you walk fifteen minutes past any cable-car station, and the further sections — Yangjiajie, the Great Sightseeing Terrace — are often close to empty.
Then there is the absurdity of the infrastructure. A glass elevator climbs 335 metres up a cliff face in under two minutes. A cable car leaves from the middle of downtown Zhangjiajie and lands you on a summit 1,500 metres up. A road with exactly 99 hairpin bends winds to a natural arch punched clean through a mountain. It should feel like a theme park, and somehow it doesn't.
Zhangjiajie
Seven things that are worth rearranging a day for.
Highlights
The Wulingyuan core is a forest of quartz-sandstone spires — some 3,000 of them — that rise 200 to 300 metres straight out of the valley floor. You do not look at them from a distance; the cable cars, the glass elevators and the cliff-edge walkways put you level with the tops. The park ticket is ¥245 plus ¥3 insurance, valid for three days and including the shuttle buses.
The Hallelujah Mountain (once called Qiankun Pillar) is the 150-metre spike that inspired the floating rocks of Pandora, and the park renamed it after the film. It sits in Yuanjiajie, the single most photographed plateau in the park — go early, because every tour group in Hunan converges here by 10am.
Golden Whip Stream runs flat along the valley floor between the Forest Park gate and Shuiraosimen, with peaks towering on both sides and a stream you can hear the whole way. Two and a half hours, no stairs, and the best introduction to the park if your legs are still fresh.
Tianmen Mountain's cableway is 7,455 metres long and begins in downtown Zhangjiajie, lifting you from street level to a 1,500-metre summit in about 30 minutes. Below you unrolls the 99-bend Tongtian Avenue; ahead, the 1,300-year-old Tianmen Cave, a hole punched clean through the mountain.
Sanxiaguo — a dry pot of three meats simmered without broth — is the city's signature dish and costs around ¥15 a portion. Add sour fish, smoked pork, blood tofu and wild ferns, and you have a cuisine built on chilli, smoke and fermentation rather than delicacy.
Itineraries
The standard route through Wulingyuan Scenic Area, entering at one gate and leaving at another. It covers the four headline areas — Golden Whip Stream, Yuanjiajie, Yangjiajie and Tianzi Mountain — and sleeps two nights inside the park so you are not commuting from the city every morning.
Start at Zhangjiajie Central Bus Station; the tourist shuttle to the Forest Park gate costs ¥11 and takes 35 to 40 minutes. Walk 300 metres past the gate and you are at the mouth of Golden Whip Stream.
At the spot called Qianlixianghui you can climb the rough path on the left to Yuanjiajie in about 1.5 hours, or continue flat to Shuiraosimen and take the Bailong Elevator up — 335 metres of vertical climb in 1 minute 58 seconds, ¥72 one way.
Stops: Golden Whip StreamQianlixianghuiShuiraosimenBailong ElevatorYuanjiajieMihun TerraceBack GardenHallelujah MountainFirst Bridge Under Heaven
Yangjiajie has no cable car and only about 20 percent of it is developed — expect rough paths, some scrambling, and around five hours for the Wulong Village to Sky Corridor line. It is the emptiest and most rewarding walking in the park.
Take the shuttle to the Wulong Village junction, walk down the steps to the wooden restaurant, and branch left for the Sky Corridor or right for Wulong Village and Tianbo Mansion. From Yibudengtian (32 iron steps to a 1,130-metre platform) continue on to the Sky Corridor.
Stops: Wulong VillageTianbo MansionYibudengtianSky CorridorDingxiangrong Village
Get up before dawn for sunrise at Daguan Terrace — the only place in the park where you can watch it, roughly 5am in summer and 7am in winter, with sea-of-cloud mornings if you are lucky. From the junction below, Shenjizhuoshi and Yibunanxing are 30 minutes return; Xianren Bridge and Tianzi Seat are 1.5 hours return.
Shuttle to Tianzi Mountain, getting off at Shentang Bay for the viewpoint, then walk to Helong Park for Yubi Peak and Xiannv Sanhua. Descend by shuttle or the Tianzi cable car (¥67 one way) to the Ten-Mile Gallery, walk it in two hours or ride the mini-train back for ¥38, then exit at the Wulingyuan gate and shuttle back to the city.
Stops: Daguan TerraceShenjizhuoshiShentang BayHelong ParkYubi PeakTianzi Mountain Cable CarTen-Mile Gallery
The same three-day Wulingyuan core, plus the two sights that sit outside the park boundary and are genuinely worth the extra days: Tianmen Mountain above the city, and the Huanglong Cave and Baofeng Lake pair east of Wulingyuan. Add a sixth day if you want the Maoyan River rafting.
Catch the bus from Zhangjiajie city to the Tianzi Mountain gate (¥13, about 90 minutes), buy your ticket, and ride the shuttle straight to the summit instead of climbing the 8,000-odd steps. Spend the afternoon on Tianzi Mountain and walk or ride down to the Ten-Mile Gallery.
Sleep inside the park at Dingxiangrong — it is the only way to be at Daguan Terrace for sunrise the next morning.
Stops: Tianzi Mountain gateTianzi MountainTen-Mile GalleryDingxiangrong Village
Sunrise at Daguan Terrace, then shuttle to the Wulong Village junction and walk the Wulong Village, Tianbo Mansion, Yibudengtian and Sky Corridor circuit — around five hours and the hardest walking of the trip.
If you have energy left, hire a car from Dingxiangrong (about ¥120) to reach two viewpoints that are not officially open and no shuttle bus serves: Shenbing Juhui, where 30 stone peaks crowd into one gorge, and Kongzhong Tianyuan, a 40-plot terraced field perched on the high ridges.
Stops: Daguan TerraceWulong VillageTianbo MansionSky CorridorShenbing JuhuiKongzhong Tianyuan
The classic set-piece morning in Yuanjiajie: Mihun Terrace, the Back Garden, Hallelujah Mountain and the First Bridge Under Heaven, all strung along a cliff-edge path with 300-metre drops on your left.
Ride the Bailong Elevator down in the afternoon and walk the full 15 li (7.5 km) of Golden Whip Stream back to the Forest Park gate, then take the shuttle to the city. Tianmen Mountain is next, and you will want a proper bed.
Stops: YuanjiajieMihun TerraceHallelujah MountainFirst Bridge Under HeavenBailong ElevatorGolden Whip StreamForest Park gate
Sights
Engineering spectacle
A glass lift bolted to a cliff face, climbing 335 metres in 1 minute 58 seconds and carrying the Guinness record for the world's tallest, fastest and heaviest outdoor elevator. The payoff is the moment you break out of the shaft: the peaks of Shenbing Juhui, one of the park's ten great views, line up in front of you like ranks of soldiers. Ride it up if you are short of time, down if your legs are done.
Tip Queues at the elevator can run over an hour from May to October. Ride before 9am or after 3pm, or accept the walk instead.
Valley walk
A flat 7.5-kilometre path through the bottom of the gorge, with named peaks on both sides — Golden Whip Rock, Split the Mountain to Save the Mother, Scholar's Hidden Books, Twin Turtles Probing the Stream, Zhang Liang's Tomb. The stream runs beside you the whole way and the air is noticeably cooler than on the plateaus. It is the one long walk in the park that asks nothing of your knees.
Tip There is a monkey section along the stream. Do not take food out of your bag — the macaques grab, and they bite.
The classic panorama
A plateau on the north side of the park where the postcard views actually live: Mihun Terrace, the Back Garden, Hallelujah Mountain and the First Bridge Under Heaven, a natural stone arch spanning two peaks with a 40-metre viewing platform opposite. Every tour group in the province comes here, so the paths get thick — but the scenery justifies the crowd.
Tip The whole Yuanjiajie path runs along cliff edges with 300- to 400-metre drops. Stop walking when you raise your camera.
Wild, unfinished, uncrowded
Only about 20 percent of Yangjiajie is developed, and it shows — narrow paths, iron ladders, some hands-on-rock scrambling, and almost nobody else. Wulong Village was a bandit stronghold chosen for its position: cliffs on all four sides, one way in and out. Tianbo Mansion faces ten parallel stone walls that look like the foundations of an ancient mansion; Yibudengtian is a 1,130-metre platform reached by 32 iron steps.
Tip If you commit to Yibudengtian or the Sky Corridor, finish the line — there is no shortcut back and turning around wastes the hardest hour.
Above the city
Not to be confused with Tianzi Mountain inside the park — this is the separate massif that stands over Zhangjiajie city, reached by a 7,455-metre cableway that starts downtown and climbs to about 1,500 metres. At the top: the Guigu Cliff Walkway, a 60-metre glass skywalk pinned to a vertical wall, and Tianmen Cave, a natural arch punched through the summit ridge at over 1,000 metres. The 99-bend road up to the cave is an attraction in its own right.
Tip The ticket price is steep but it covers the cableway and the cave. Go on a clear day — in cloud you pay full price and see grey.
Food
The dish that made this city famous — a dry hotpot of three main ingredients stewed with almost no broth. The classic combo is stir-fried intestines, stir-fried walnut meat and western Hunan cured pork. A small pot (about ¥15) comfortably feeds two, and it is best chased with a plate of crunchy pickled radish. Not one for anyone who likes their food mild.
Tujia cooking leans hard on sour, smoked and pickled. Pork and fish are packed with glutinous rice powder and fermented, which keeps them through the humid summers and gives them a tangy, faintly fizzy bite. You will find it on almost every Tujia table — ask for it cold as a starter.
The Tujia New Year dish: radish, tofu, cabbage, spring onion, pork and red chili simmered together in one pot. It is meant to symbolise a full harvest and a reunited family. Cheap, homely and served everywhere; a good way to eat vegetables after days of cured meat.
A Tujia classic with a method worth hearing: live loach are purged overnight in salted water, then dropped into a block of soft white tofu so they burrow into it before the whole thing is braised with Sichuan pepper, ginger, spring onion and soy. The result is silky and subtle rather than scary.
Eaten on the spring She festival. Wild spring onion and she herbs are dried in the pan, fatty cured pork is fried until fragrant, then glutinous and ordinary rice are cooked together and steamed with the greens and meat folded through. Lift the lid and the whole room smells of it. Also try hezha, a soybean-and-greens porridge the Tujia say saved lives in lean years.
Eating out
Local institution
The most popular sanxiaguo counter in town, and the portions back it up — one small pot is plenty for two and the signature three-ingredient stew is deeply savoury. Expect a queue at peak hours and go elsewhere if you want anything delicate. Budget roughly ¥36 per person, and if you are planning a private tour of Zhangjiajie with a food stop built in, this is the address to give your guide.
Reliable sit-down
A clean, fast, well-run Hunan restaurant above Dayong Fucheng that locals rate highly. The two dishes to order are guoba gai rou — crisp rice crust buried under braised pork — and yan'er tuji, free-range chicken stewed with rock fungus picked off the cliffs. Good for a group dinner or a first night when you want air-conditioning and a menu you can point at.
Where locals eat
A live-fish restaurant whose tables are mostly filled with residents, always a good sign. The mandarin fish pot arrives with several whole fish and a properly built broth — the fish are seared in oil first, which is what gives it depth. It runs a touch salty, so say so if you prefer things lighter.
Breakfast
Two Zhangjiajie breakfast institutions. The twenty-year-old rice noodle shop near the armed forces office is famous for its lamb offal noodles, with queues down the street every morning from about 6am; a bowl is roughly ¥5. Straw Hat Noodles is named for the owner who has worn the same straw hat for years — hand-made noodles, generous minced-pork topping, help yourself to extra. Eat where the locals queue.
Where to sleep
Budget, best location
Sleeping up on the mountain is the single biggest upgrade to a Zhangjiajie trip: you wake above the cloud layer and walk onto the viewing platforms before the first tour bus arrives. Dorm beds start around ¥40, doubles from about ¥130, and the park hostels — including the ones at Yuanjiajie and Dingxiangrong — are basic but warm, with showers and home cooking. Dingxiangrong is the village to pick if you want to catch sunrise at Daguantai; note the winter shutdown when the shuttle stops running there, reopening each March.
Mid-range, resort comfort
The town at the Wulingyuan gate is the most convenient base outside the park: you can be at the ticket station in minutes and there are restaurants and shops on your doorstep. The Pullman Zhangjiajie is the plushest foreign-brand option in the area, with a pool and full facilities, from around ¥785 — good if you want a proper resort night between hiking days rather than a dorm. Just accept that you will still queue for the shuttle each morning.
Cheap, transport-first
Staying in the city near the central bus station is the budget and logistics play: express hotels such as Super 8 or Jinjiang Inn run about ¥199–220 a night, the international youth hostel has beds from ¥30 and doubles from ¥90, and the airport is 5 km away with the railway station 3 km. From here the tourist shuttle to the Forest Park or Wulingyuan gate takes 35–40 minutes for ¥11. Downside: you are outside the scenery and will spend an hour a day commuting.
Getting around
Zhangjiajie Hehua Airport (DYG) sits just 5 km from the city centre and links more than 20 Chinese cities, but schedules change constantly and some routes don't fly daily — always re-check your flight before booking a tight connection.
Zhangjiajie's new station is right in the city centre, with buses 1 and 6 starting from directly opposite the exit. From Changsha it's a little over 5 hours, with 7 departures a day; one slower service loops via Jishou and Huaihua (about 11 hours) and is only worth taking if you're heading on to Fenghuang.
The Central Bus Station sits on the west side of the new railway station square and runs coaches to Wuhan, Shanghai, Suzhou, Changde and the surrounding scenic areas. Buses from Changsha's West Station leave every 30 minutes (¥100–120, about 4 hours), and there's a direct Fenghuang service at 07:50 from beside the Wulingyuan gate for ¥72.
Shuttle buses inside Wulingyuan are already covered by your entrance ticket and run 07:00–17:00, roughly every 20 minutes, with stops at every major sight. Cable cars, the Bailong Elevator and the mini-train cost extra — budget for them, because using them saves your legs for the parts of Yangjiajie that have no alternative.
Shopping
Zhangjiajie's small wild kiwis are only a little bigger than an egg and taste sweet-sour. Buy them underripe if you're carrying them home — ripe ones turn to mush in a day. Skip the oversized cultivated ones sold at the gates.
Ground from wild kudzu root grown on the Wuling slopes, mixed with hot water and a spoon of sugar, or simmered with meat as a dish. Loose powder runs about ¥7 per jin — buy it in a proper supermarket, because sweet-potato starch is passed off as the real thing everywhere else.
Hand-woven on an old wooden loom with cotton warp and coloured silk weft, made into wall hangings, sachets and clothing. Dense, strong colours and symmetrical patterns of flowers, birds and beasts — the most genuinely local craft you can buy here.
Duzhong leaf tea is drunk for blood pressure and slimming; real leaves pull into threads when you break them, fakes don't. Sangzhi salt tofu — a Qing-dynasty tribute item — is the other reliable edible souvenir, cheap and easy to carry.
Practicalities
Book accommodation before you travel in high season, roughly May to November: Zhangjiajie receives over 20,000 visitors a day, and 50,000 a day during National Day week, when cable car and Bailong Elevator queues can stretch past an hour. If you'd rather not shuffle along in a crowd, head for Yangjiajie and Daguantai — the tour buses skip them, and the views are just as good. Compare a few licensed guides before committing, and for a full day-by-day plan see our Zhangjiajie itinerary.
| Wulingyuan ticket | ¥245 + ¥3 insurance, valid 3 days with unlimited rides on the park shuttle; concession ¥165 + 3; weekly pass ¥298. Cable cars, the Bailong Elevator and the mini-train are NOT included. |
|---|---|
| Tianmen Mountain ticket | ¥258 + ¥3, covering the round-trip cable car, Tianmen Cave, the summit area and shuttle buses. Allow about 5 hours. |
| Huanglong Cave & Baofeng Lake | Huanglong Cave ¥80 (concession 45), open 07:30–17:30 high season, 08:00–17:00 low season. Baofeng Lake ¥74 (concession 42). |
| Opening hours & park shuttles | Park shuttles run 07:00–17:00. In winter, ice on the summit roads can suspend services to Daguantai and Yangjiajie — call 0744-5555555 before setting out. |
| Money & withdrawals | Draw cash in the city — ATMs inside the scenic area are few and far between. ICBC Xixiping branch: 0744-8512496. CCB Chongwen Road branch: 0744-8323266. |
| Emergencies & services | People's Hospital, Guyong Road 192: 0744-8222270. Police: 0744-8222151. Wulingyuan tourism bureau: 0744-5618109. City tourism office: 0744-8380188. |
| Scams to avoid | Ignore the hotel touts and unlicensed guides who mob you at the station square, and never pick up strangers on the road in — they're often illegal guides working with shops and drivers. The 'thousand-year-old human-shaped heshouwu' sold in the mountains is fake, and don't buy 'antiques' or 'rare herbs' unless you truly know the trade. |
Background
Zhangjiajie's pillars are quartz sandstone, laid down as sediment on a shallow sea floor around 380 million years ago, then lifted, fractured and carved by water and wind into the 3,000-odd towers you walk among today. The vertical joints in the rock are what let it split into columns instead of eroding into ordinary hills, which is why the peaks stand like fence posts rather than slopes. In 1992 Wulingyuan was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and in 2004 it was added to the Global Geoparks Network.
Until the early 1980s almost nobody outside Hunan had heard of this place; the painter Wu Guanzhong wrote an essay in 1980 that put it on the national map, and tourism infrastructure followed within a decade. The city itself was renamed Zhangjiajie in 1994, taking the name of a small village inside the park. Locals still use the old name Dayong for the urban core, and you will see it on bus signs and restaurant fronts. The 2009 film Avatar borrowed the floating Hallelujah Mountains from these peaks, and the park leaned into it hard — the pillar once called Qiankun Column was officially renamed Hallelujah Mountain in 2010. The tourism board will tell you the resemblance is uncanny. It is close enough that you will probably take the photo anyway.
Reading & watching
dir. James Cameron
The floating Hallelujah Mountains were modelled on the sandstone pillars of Wulingyuan, and the pillar formerly known as Qiankun Column was formally renamed after the film. Watch it on the flight in, then judge for yourself how much Cameron exaggerated. Our Zhangjiajie tour packages put you on the ground beneath them.
Wu Guanzhong, painter
The short essay that dragged Zhangjiajie out of obscurity and onto the national tourism map. Wu was one of China's great modern painters, and he writes about the peaks the way a painter looks at them — mass, line, negative space. Worth reading for the reminder that this landscape was unknown to the wider world barely forty years ago.
Shen Congwen
Not set in Zhangjiajie itself but in Fenghuang, four hours west down the same Hunan river country. It is the book that made the region's wooden stilt houses, ferry crossings and Miao villages famous, and it is the best preparation for the western Hunan leg of a longer trip. Pair it with our Fenghuang and Furong Town add-on route.
The questions visitors ask us most about Zhangjiajie, answered plainly.
Prices and practical details are reviewed every month by our Beijing team and updated the day a rule changes.
April and October are the best months — the light is clear, the temperatures sit around 20°C (68°F) and the viewpoints are at their sharpest. July brings heavy rain, and climbing in rain is both slippery and pointless because cloud swallows the peaks; the one to two hours right after rain, though, produce the most dramatic mist-wrapped scenery of the year. Winter drops to around 0°C and snow does not close the park — you may get rime ice and a sea of cloud.
Three full days for Wulingyuan Scenic Area alone, staying inside the park for two nights so you are not commuting through the gates each morning. Add one day for Tianmen Mountain and one more for Huanglong Cave and Baofeng Lake, and a five-day trip covers everything worth seeing. Anyone who tries to do the park as a day trip from the city sees perhaps a fifth of it.
Yes — ¥245 plus ¥3 insurance buys three days of entry and unlimited use of the park's shuttle buses, which is the only way to move between the different areas. It does not include the Bailong Elevator (¥72 one way), the Tianzi Mountain cable car (¥67 one way) or the Huangshizhai cable car (¥65 one way, ¥118 return). A weekly pass is ¥298 if you want longer.
Take them. The elevator lifts you 335 metres in 1 minute 58 seconds, and the cable cars save you 8,000-plus steps that you will want for the walking-only sections. Walk Golden Whip Stream and the Ten-Mile Gallery on the valley floor, ride up, and spend your legs on Yangjiajie and the Great Sightseeing Terrace, which have no mechanical shortcuts at all.
The train from Changsha takes about 5 hours and there are seven departures a day. By road it is 320 km on the Changsha–Changde–Zhangjiajie expressway, roughly 2.5 to 3.5 hours with about ¥200 in tolls. Buses leave Changsha West Bus Station every half hour, cost ¥100–120 and take about 4 hours. Zhangjiajie Hehua Airport, 5 km from the city centre, has flights to more than 20 Chinese cities, though not all routes operate daily.
From May to November the park receives more than 20,000 visitors a day, and over National Day week that can hit 50,000 — the elevator and cable cars then queue for over an hour. Book accommodation inside the park well in advance, and if you hate crowds head for Yangjiajie or the Great Sightseeing Terrace, which tour groups skip entirely. Going up the elevator before 9am buys you a much quieter Yuanjiajie.
Plan this trip
The same places, with a driver, an English-speaking guide and the tickets already bought.
The sandstone pillars that inspired the floating mountains of Avatar, plus the glass elevator, Tianzi Mountain and the longest cableway in Asia.
From US$1,190/per person
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Haikou
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Hainan's capital is the island's living city — 600-year-old arcade streets, a volcanic village, and a morning-tea-to-midnight food culture.
Beihai
City guide · 12 tours
24 km of fine white sand on one side, a volcanic island of coral and lava on the other — plus a 19th-century arcade old street in between.
Nanning
City guide · 12 tours
Guangxi's green capital is a gateway to Detian Falls, Beihai and Vietnam — and a genuinely excellent food city if you let it slow you down.
Guangxi
City guide · 12 tours
One autonomous region, a dozen landscapes — limestone peaks and rice terraces in the north, a Vietnam border and a warm gulf coast in the south.
Huizhou
City guide · 12 tours
A free West Lake, a Taoist mountain and 200 km of white-sand coast — the Pearl River Delta's most underrated weekend.
Beidaihe
City guide · 12 tours
Northern China's classic beach escape — one sunrise headland, 10 km of calm swimming water, and a bird flyway overhead twice a year.
Shanhaiguan
City guide · 12 tours
The town where the Great Wall stops being a rumour of mountains and walks into the Bohai Sea.
Baiyangdian
City guide · 12 tours
The biggest freshwater lake on the North China Plain — and almost none of it can be reached except by boat.
Qinhuangdao
City guide · 12 tours
126 km of Bohai coast in one municipality — a working port, two famous resorts, and the only desert dunes that meet this sea.
Yesanpo
City guide · 12 tours
Gorge country where the Taihang and Yan ranges collide — 52.5 km of canyon walls, a cave that spits fish, and a river to fall off.
Zhuhai
City guide · 12 tours
The delta's slow city: a 28 km promenade, 146 islands, oysters fattened where the river meets the sea.
Wuyi Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
Nine bends of clear water, red sandstone cliffs, and the tea that made a mountain's name.
Jiuzhaigou
City guide · 12 tours
108 mineral-blue lakes in one 55 km valley — the place that ruins water everywhere else for you.
Mount Siguniang
City guide · 12 tours
Four snow peaks, three valleys, and the friendliest 5,000 m mountain in China to stand on top of.
Hailuogou
City guide · 12 tours
A glacier that comes down to 2,850 m, hot springs in the forest, and Gongga Shan filling the sky above both.
Daocheng Yading
City guide · 12 tours
Three 6,000 m sacred peaks, glacial lakes at 4,600 m and twenty hours of road — the hardest, highest payoff in Sichuan.
Shunan Bamboo Sea
City guide · 12 tours
Seventy thousand mu of bamboo over twenty-eight hills, a red sandstone corridor under a closed green roof, and a banquet made entirely of bamboo.
Dujiangyan
City guide · 12 tours
Not a monument but a machine: three pieces of engineering with no dam, still doing their job after 2,270 years.
Qingcheng Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
The mountain where Daoism was organised, and the one Chengdu escapes to when the basin turns into an oven.
Qingdao
City guide · 12 tours
Red-tiled roofs, cold beer and a granite mountain that walks straight into the sea — the easiest good time on the Yellow Sea.
Mount Tai
City guide · 12 tours
1,545 metres, 6,290 stone steps and three thousand years of emperors — the one mountain in China that is also a document.
Jinan
City guide · 12 tours
A provincial capital with 700 springs under the pavement — people still queue at the spouts to fill their kettles.
Weihai
City guide · 12 tours
1,000 km of clean coast, a free bathing beach, the island where the Beiyang Fleet died — and thousands of wild swans every winter.
Qufu
City guide · 12 tours
One family, two thousand years of steles, and a ¥150 pass that covers the lot — the easiest serious day trip in Shandong.
Penglai
City guide · 12 tours
China's immortals' coast — a Song-dynasty naval harbour you can walk for free, a mythology nobody ever found, and the ferry to 32 islands.
Changdao
City guide · 12 tours
32 islands, one causeway, a ¥150 land pass, tens of thousands of gulls and nowhere you can drive — the place where everything happens by boat.
Nanjing
City guide · 12 tours
Capital of six dynasties, capital of the Republic, and the city that eats more duck than anywhere else on earth.
Suzhou
City guide · 12 tours
Two thousand five hundred years of canals, sixty surviving gardens, and a city that shuts its gates at half past five.
Zhouzhuang
City guide · 12 tours
Nine hundred years, fourteen bridges, one ticket — and a town that only makes sense before eight in the morning.
Tongli
City guide · 12 tours
Fifteen canals, seven islets, forty-nine bridges — and a town that still gets up at dawn because it lives here.
Wuxi
City guide · 12 tours
Taihu on one side, a Grand Buddha on the next hill, and ribs sweet enough to argue about — the most underrated city on the Yangtze delta.
Yangzhou
City guide · 12 tours
A city built by salt merchants who had more money than restraint — gardens, a narrow lake, and the best breakfast in China.
Zhenjiang
City guide · 12 tours
Three hills, one ferry landing, and an unreasonable share of Chinese literature — the Yangtze city people drive past.
Changzhou
City guide · 12 tours
A 2,500-year-old canal city that built a dinosaur park and refuses to apologise for it.
Wuzhen
City guide · 12 tours
A town that is two towns: the older, quieter East Zone and the lit-up West Zone you sleep inside.
Xitang
City guide · 12 tours
Nine canals, 122 lanes, one long roofed corridor — and a town that still works for a living.
Hangzhou
City guide · 12 tours
A lake in the middle of a city, a tea village in the hills, and two thousand years of getting the mood right.
Xixi Wetland
City guide · 12 tours
Ten square kilometres of marsh inside Hangzhou, and the only way into half of it is a boat.
Ningbo
City guide · 12 tours
A 7,000-year-old port with Asia's oldest private library, a free waterfront 20 years older than Shanghai's, and the best seafood before the islands.
Mount Putuo
City guide · 12 tours
A Buddhist island with no cars, three great temples and a ¥10 lunch that is the point of the place.
Qiandao Lake
City guide · 12 tours
A thousand islands that did not exist sixty years ago, and the cleanest big-lake water in China.
Shaoxing
City guide · 12 tours
Two and a half thousand years of water-town China, and Lu Xun's house is free.
Zhoushan
City guide · 12 tours
1,390 islands, one road bridge in, and a harbour that lands more fish than almost anywhere on earth.
Hengdian
City guide · 12 tours
A backlot the size of a town, where the palaces are copies and the film crews are real.
Yandang Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
A volcano that weathering turned into scenery — 500-odd sights of peak, cave and waterfall across eight scenic areas.
Zhejiang
City guide · 12 tours
One small, mountainous, absurdly rich province that holds a lake, two canal towns, a Buddhist island and a dead volcano.
Hong Kong Outlying Islands
City guide · 12 tours
Two hundred-odd islands, half an hour of ferry from the financial district, and not a car on three of them.
Hong Kong Shopping
City guide · 12 tours
A duty-free port where the tag starts lower, two citywide sale seasons knock a third off, and every mall sits on an MTR exit.
Macao
City guide · 12 tours
Four hundred years of Portuguese streets, a fake Venice under a painted sky, and the best egg tart in Asia.
Urumqi
City guide · 12 tours
The city furthest from the sea, with a snow range on its doorstep and dinner starting at nine.
Hong Kong SAR, China
City guide · 11 tours
A harbour skyline you already know by heart, dim sum trolleys at dawn, and 260 islands an hour from the neon.
Taiwan, China
City guide · 11 tours
Night-market alleys, high-mountain railways, and a coastline that changes character every hundred kilometres.
Qinghai Lake
City guide · 12 tours
A 4,400 sq km inland sea at 3,200 m, ringed by rapeseed gold, prayer flags and the best cycling road in China.
Mount Emei
City guide · 11 tours
A 3,099-metre Buddhist summit you can reach by cable car before lunch — and a mountain full of monkeys that will absolutely rob you.
Beijing
City guide · 11 tours
Six centuries of imperial red walls, a Great Wall you can climb before lunch, and the best roast duck on earth.
Taipei
City guide · 11 tours
A 24-hour bookstore, a night market that never stops sizzling, and a city that apologises when you bump into it.
North Xinjiang
City guide · 11 tours
Alpine lakes the colour of poured enamel, a village of log cabins under birch trees, and the last tear the Atlantic ever sheds.
Lanzhou
City guide · 11 tours
A city split in half by the Yellow River, where beef noodles are a breakfast ritual and the Silk Road still runs through the streets.
Mount Hua
City guide · 11 tours
Five granite peaks, one plank road bolted to a cliff face, and a sunrise that justifies the 2am start.
Dunhuang
City guide · 11 tours
A desert oasis where Buddhist cave art survived a thousand years and a crescent lake refused to dry up.
Gannan
City guide · 11 tours
433 kilometres of the Yellow River's first bend, a 3.5 km prayer-wheel circuit, and Tibetan grasslands almost nobody has commercialised yet.
Sichuan–Tibet Highway
City guide · 11 tours
2,142 kilometres of cliff-edge switchbacks, four of China's most beautiful mountains, and a road the Tibetans walk on their knees.
Kangding
City guide · 11 tours
The town that gave Asia its most famous love song, a 7,556m sacred peak on its doorstep, and the last real Tibetan town before the road climbs to Lhasa.
Lhasa
City guide · 12 tours
A city of prayer wheels and butter lamps at 3,700 metres, where the sun shines 3,000 hours a year and the world's highest palace watches over it all.
Nyingchi
City guide · 11 tours
Tibet's greenest corner — peach blossom valleys, a 7,782 m peak that hides from almost everyone, and the world's deepest canyon.
Namtso
City guide · 11 tours
A 1,920-square-kilometre sheet of impossible blue at 4,718 metres, ringed by snow peaks and prayer flags.
Chongqing
City guide · 12 tours
A vertical city of fog, cable cars and cliff-side stilt houses, where the火锅 never stops boiling and the night skyline outshines Hong Kong.
Qiandongnan
City guide · 11 tours
A thousand Miao households stacked up a mountainside, drum towers and wind-rain bridges in Dong villages, and a 600-year-old Ming garrison town on the road to Guiyang.
Libo
City guide · 11 tours
Emerald rivers threading through karst peaks, a 600-metre forest growing out of a riverbed, and China's largest wild plum grove.
Guiyang
City guide · 11 tours
China's summer capital at 1,100 metres, where the nights run on sour fish soup, street-side barbecue and mahjong that never quite stops.
Zhenyuan
City guide · 11 tours
A 2,000-year-old river town where the Wuyang River carves an S through the mountains and every lane hides a story.
Huangguoshu
City guide · 11 tours
Asia's biggest waterfall, and the only one on earth you can walk behind, above and around — plus 600-year-old Ming dynasty villages a short drive away.
Harbin
City guide · 11 tours
Minus 30 degrees, a frozen river you can walk across, and a cathedral built by Russians who never went home.
Yunnan
City guide · 11 tours
Snow mountains, tropical rainforest, twenty-five minorities and a plate of rice noodles — all in one province.
Shanghai
City guide · 11 tours
A 1920s waterfront of colonial banks facing a science-fiction skyline, soup dumplings you eat with a straw, and 20 million people moving like clockwork.
Guangzhou
City guide · 11 tours
A 2,200-year-old trading port where dim sum is a religion, colonial islands sit beside 600-metre towers, and the food never stops.
Guilin
City guide · 11 tours
Karst peaks rising straight out of a green river, rice terraces carved into mountainsides, and the best bowl of noodles you'll eat in China.
Shenzhen
City guide · 11 tours
A fishing village that became a megacity in forty years — and it still has 500-year-old banyans, empty beaches and dim sum worth the border crossing.
Chengdu
City guide · 11 tours
A 3,000-year-old city where the schedule is tea, mahjong and hotpot — and the pandas are just the opening act.
Xinjiang
City guide · 11 tours
Snow peaks, grassland, desert and oasis — one-sixth of China, and the longest road you will ever ride.
Xi'an
City guide · 14 tours
Thirteen dynasties of emperors, a terracotta army buried for 2,200 years, and a walled city you can cycle in 100 minutes.
Qinghai
City guide · 11 tours
China's high-altitude blue heart: a salt lake you can walk on, a 3,200-metre sea, and yak butter tea at the roof of the world.
Tibet
City guide · 11 tours
A plateau the size of Western Europe where the sky starts at your feet, prayer flags carry the wind, and the roads run past 8,000-metre peaks.
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