City guide · Guizhou
A 2,000-year-old river town where the Wuyang River carves an S through the mountains and every lane hides a story.
Reviewed by our Beijing team Updated 2026-10-10
The short version
City guide
Photographs from the coast, and what other travellers wrote afterwards.
Zhenyuan has a kind of beauty that does not shout at you — it seeps in quietly, like the green Wuyang River flowing through the town, washing away everything flashy and leaving only what matters.
Sue Su Mo, 'Taoyuan: Zhenyuan'
Early morning in Zhenyuan is completely still. Mist hangs over the river, an old man throws his fishing net, ducks paddle along the bank, and the mountains breathe fog. It feels like a real painting, not a tourist one.
Qianlv CB, 'National Day Trip to Zhenyuan, Fanjing Mountain and Fenghuang'
Step off the train in Zhenyuan and within ten minutes you are standing on a stone embankment watching the Wuyang River slide past in a deep jade green, mountains rising on both banks like folded screens. The old town spills along the water in a lazy S-curve, its wooden houses stacked up the hillside, its lanes so narrow that two people pass with a nod. This is not a theme park reconstruction — people actually live here, hanging laundry over the river and frying fish in doorways.
The town earned its nickname 'the lock of Yunnan and Chu, the gateway to eastern Guizhou' because every army that wanted to control the southwest had to take it first. That military past left behind walls, garrisons, guild halls and a strange mix of Buddhist, Confucian and Taoist temples packed into one cliff face. Qinglong Cave is the strangest of them all: a Buddhist hall housing a Taoist immortal, a Confucian shrine handing its best room to Laozi, a Taoist temple with Guanyin in the front.
Come evening, the whole riverfront lights up in gold and red, and the mountains go black against the sky. Take the 1-yuan ferry just to be on the water, or walk the embankment where families eat grilled fish at plastic tables and old men play cards under the trees. It is quiet, cheap, and stubbornly un-touristy compared with Guizhou's bigger names.
Zhenyuan
Seven things that are worth rearranging a day for.
Highlights
The Wuyang River cuts an S-curve straight through Zhenyuan, and the old town sits inside the loop with Shiping Mountain rising behind it — locals call the shape a taiji diagram. It has been a walled garrison and trading post for over two millennia, which is why you get ancient lanes, old wharves, guild halls and temples packed into a few walkable blocks instead of a rebuilt tourist set.
Despite the name, Qinglong Cave is not a cave at all — it is a cluster of halls, pavilions and bridges pinned to the face of Zhonghe Mountain above the river. It is the rare place where Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism share one compound, with a Buddhist hall housing the Daoist immortal Zhang Sanfeng and a Confucian shrine giving its top floor to Laozi. Entry is CNY 60, students half price, open 08:00–16:00.
Zhenyuan's little cross-river ferries take one minute and cost CNY 1 per person, which makes them the cheapest sightseeing on the river. At night, when the bridges, eaves and riverside houses are lit up, that single minute is the best-value view in town — far cheaper than the CNY 100 painted-boat cruise, though the cruise does last longer and includes folk performances.
Zhenyuan is a river town, so fish is the thing: sour-soup fish (suantang yu) made with fermented tomato broth, or tofu-pudding fish, both built on the Miao saying that you cannot go three days without sour food. Pair it with chennian daocai, a dark, intensely savoury preserved mustard green first made by Daoist priests at Qinglong Cave, and finish with ginger candy pulled in the shop doorway.
Heping Village is the only Japanese prisoner-of-war camp preserved in China, in use from 1939 to 1944 as the Second Japanese POW Camp of the Nationalist Military Commission, and now a free museum. It is a sober half hour that most visitors skip, and it sits a short walk from the old town on Heping Street. Open 08:00–17:30 in summer, 08:00–17:00 in winter.
Itineraries
The sensible first visit — one full day on foot in the old town, one day out on the Wuyang River, and a morning on the mountain for the view everyone photographs. Book your Wuyang River boat the day before and keep the third day flexible, because rain in Guizhou cancels river trips without much warning.
Walk the riverside first thing, then climb into Qinglong Cave for the cliffside temples and the view back over the roofs. Cross Zhusheng Bridge, wander the ancient lanes to Tianhou Temple, and finish the afternoon on the old city wall.
After dark, take the CNY 1 ferry across the river and back just to watch the lights come up on the water. Do not book the CNY 100 painted cruise unless you want the performances — the ferry gives you the same skyline for one yuan.
Stops: Wuyang River promenadeQinglong CaveZhusheng BridgeAncient lanesTianhou TempleOld city wallNight ferry
The drive out is under 30 minutes on a recently rebuilt road. Two hours on the boat plus about 30 minutes on the scenic walkway makes the whole excursion roughly four hours door to door.
If you would rather stay in town, swap this for the Tiesi Stream valley, 4 km northeast of the old town, where the Longchi pool is a deep, still blue-green and the forest is genuinely quiet — CNY 50, open 08:00–17:30. It is billed as a mini Jiuzhaigou and that is close enough to be worth it.
Stops: Wuyang River scenic areaBoat cruiseRiverside walkwayTiesi Stream (alternative)
Climb Shiping Mountain for the full panorama of the S-bend and the Miao frontier wall on the ridge. Entry is CNY 30, but walk up before 08:00 and it is free — the single best money-saving trick in Zhenyuan.
Come down, eat one last bowl of beef rice noodles, and catch an afternoon train. If you have a late departure, add Gaoguo River rafting instead: CNY 180, students half price, 4.8 km of river with a 200 m drop, about 2.5–3 hours on the water.
Stops: Shiping MountainMiao frontier wallBeef rice noodlesGaoguo River rafting (alternative)
For travellers who have already done the postcard route or want something less polished. You trade one river cruise for a rafting gorge and a Dong village that sees very few outsiders, and you keep the old town for the evenings when it is at its best.
Walk the old town, see Qinglong Cave, cross Zhusheng Bridge and stay out for the night lights. There is no reason to rush this day — it is the core of the trip.
Eat sour-soup fish at Miaoboma on Heping Street, a lane-side Miao-run place where mains run CNY 20–60 and locals eat there too.
Stops: Wuyang River promenadeQinglong CaveAncient lanesMiaoboma sour-soup fish
Gaoguo River is about 90 minutes by car from the old town. Take the free 2 km shuttle or walk the gorge to the 108 m Guyudong waterfall — the tallest in Guizhou — or run the double raft, which is the reason most people come. Kids must be over 1.4 m to raft.
Rinse off, then head to Heping Village in the late afternoon. The museum closes at 17:30 in summer, so do not leave it too late.
Stops: Gaoguo River gorgeGuyudong waterfallWhitewater raftingHeping Village POW museum
Take the four-hour Wuyang River boat trip in the morning, come back for lunch, rest, then climb Shiping Mountain in the late afternoon light for the panorama.
Finish with Tiesi Stream if you have energy left, or just sit by the river with a beer and watch the town light up one last time.
Stops: Wuyang River cruiseShiping MountainTiesi StreamRiverside beer stalls
Sights
Cliff temples
A vertical maze of halls, shrines and covered walkways built onto the cliff above the Wuyang River, with the three faiths sharing the space in a way that would be odd anywhere else. Come in the morning for cooler air and fewer groups, and look back down at the river from the upper galleries — that is the shot of Zhenyuan you will actually keep.
Tip There are men in flowing robes around the complex who will invite you to burn incense for blessings at steep prices. If you are not religious, decline firmly; if you are, know that they are selling a service, not offering fellowship. This is one of the few genuine tourist traps in Qiandongnan.
River scenery
The stretch downstream from Zhenyuan runs right through the town, green and slow, with willows over the water and the old houses stacked on the far bank. Further upstream, the scenic area proper packs in gorges that get compared to Emei for elegance, Qingcheng for quiet, the Three Gorges for drama and the Li River for beauty — a tall order, but the boat ride genuinely delivers.
Tip Budget four hours round trip from Zhenyuan: two hours on the boat, half an hour on the walkway, plus transfers. The in-town stretch is free and lovely at night, so you do not have to pay for the cruise to see the river.
Panorama
The ridge directly behind the old town, and the only place to see the full S-bend of the Wuyang River and the town inside it. There is a stretch of Miao frontier wall on top, modest but genuinely old, and the view over the tiled roofs is the one every guidebook uses.
Tip Go early and you save the CNY 30 and get the ridge to yourself. Wear shoes with grip — the steps are uneven and Guizhou rain makes stone slick fast.
History
The only preserved Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in China. Between 1939 and 1944 this was the Second Japanese POW Camp of the Nationalist Military Commission, and it held more Japanese prisoners for longer than any other camp south of the Yangtze. It is now a free museum, quiet and well labelled, and it explains a side of the war that most foreign visitors have never encountered.
Tip Pair it with the former residence of Zhou Dawen, a free courtyard house nearby that was also the underground CPC branch office — same street, same opening hours, no extra cost.
Nature walk
A forested valley 4 km northeast of the old town with odd limestone caves and the Longchi pool, a still, bottomless-looking basin of deep blue-green that earned the place its "little Jiuzhaigou" nickname. It is the best half-day escape when the river boats are cancelled by rain.
Tip The walk in is shaded and cool even in midsummer, but the paths get muddy after rain. Bring the grippy shoes you already packed for Shiping Mountain.
Food
The dish this town is judged by. Guizhou sour soup comes in three shades — white sour fermented from rice water, red sour from wild tomatoes, and chilli sour from pickled peppers — and Zhenyuan leans red: tomato-based, barely spicy, faintly sweet at the finish, with a whole river fish and vegetables cooked in it. The locals' pick is Miao Bo Ma Sour Soup House (苗伯妈酸汤馆) hidden in a back lane off Heping Street, phone 13508550873, roughly CNY 20–60 a head. A second reliable option is Old Town Red Sour Fish Restaurant (古城红酸汤鱼莊) on Lianhe Street, 15086213409 — the kind of place people who grew up here come back to for the taste they remember.
Same river fish, but a pot of soft silken tofu is set into the broth and poached tableside. The tofu soaks up the sour soup and turns into the best thing in the bowl. Order it grilled over charcoal (豆花烤鱼) if you want the skin blistered and crisp instead of poached.
Nothing to do with soybeans. Rice is soaked overnight, ground to a slurry, cooked with a little alkali, then set and cut into slippery cubes with a taut thread. Zhenyuan's water is unusually good, so the cubes come out startlingly white and silky. Topped with chilli flakes, spring onion, sesame oil, soy, crunchy soybeans and peanuts — a bowl costs a few yuan and is the perfect mid-walk snack.
The one thing you cannot leave without trying. Xinglong Street, No. 21 — the only shop in town that does it. The signboard couplet reads 'stinks to the nose, blooms in the mouth'. Crisp shell, molten inside, salty-savoury with a fermented tang that has nothing to do with the chilli-hot stinky tofu you get elsewhere.
Zhenyuan's signature preserved vegetable, made from big-leaf mustard greens and originally invented by the Taoist priests of the Qinglong Cave temple — hence the name, 'the Taoists' vegetable'. It is aged in jars until dark brown and intensely savoury, then steamed with pork belly. Buy a vacuum pack on Xinglong or Shuncheng Street to take home; it travels well and completely baffles your friends.
Where to eat
Sour fish soup · local favourite
Tucked into a lane behind Heping Street, ten metres to the right of the Fujiale supermarket — no street frontage, no signboard shouting at you. 'Bo ma' is the Miao word for a married woman, and the owner is a Miao woman who cooks everything by hand with no additives. Locals eat here as often as visitors, which is the only review that matters.
Sour fish soup · nostalgic
On Lianhe Street, and the place people who grew up in Zhenyuan come back to for the taste of home. Portions are generous and the price is honest — the best value sour fish soup in the old town if you are feeding three or four.
Street snack · the one shop
Xinglong Street, No. 21, and there is genuinely only one. Fried to order, five or six pieces a portion, eaten standing up with a toothpick. Worth queuing for.
Walk-up food · cheap eats
The lanes between the old alleys and the Tianhou Temple sell home-made snacks from people's front doors — including the local peanut-stuffed zongzi, sticky rice dumplings with a green tint in the rice, one yuan each. Riverside restaurants on both banks all run roughly the same menu, so the only real difference is the price list: read it before you sit down, and when in doubt pick whichever place is full of Chinese families.
Where to sleep
Best views · book ahead in holidays
Sleeping on the river is the whole point of Zhenyuan — you open the window onto the S-bend, the lit bridges and the青龙洞 cliff at night. It also costs the most and is the first thing to be marked up in peak season, so walk the street and compare three or four before you commit. Yu Jie Hotel (宇洁宾馆) at Tiesi No. 7 is a good benchmark: eight rooms, four with river-facing balconies, directly opposite Qinglong Cave, with Shibing Mountain behind and the Zhusheng Bridge beside it. River rooms CNY 180, street rooms CNY 160, 0855-5725808.
Riverside inn · own restaurant
In the old town's Yangliu Bay, backed by the Ming city wall with its door on the Wu Yang River and its side facing the water. Twenty minutes on foot to Qinglong Cave. It runs its own kitchen, which matters after a long day of walking.
Cheapest · best for early trains
Zhenyuan's station is a short taxi ride from the old town — a flat CNY 5 or so — and the hotels around it are plain but fine, with air-con and hot water. On a non-weekend night you can talk a decent standard room down to around CNY 50 without air-conditioning, which is not a fantasy, just a matter of patience. Ideal if you have an early departure, and you still get the night skyline: watch the lights from the old town, then taxi back.
Getting around
Zhenyuan sits on the Shanghai–Kunming line, and the station is the reason most people can reach this town at all. Trains from Guiyang and Kaili are frequent and cheap; the station is 3 km from the old town, and a taxi in costs about CNY 10.
Small piers line the Wuyang River through town. For CNY 1 per person you can cross by ferry in one or two minutes instead of walking the long way round the bend — and at night it doubles as the cheapest night-view cruise in China.
The official 'Ancient Town Water Tour' uses painted pleasure boats (28 seats), performance boats (35 seats), dragon boats (20 seats) and small fishing boats (4 seats) from a dozen restored old piers. Comfortable, scenic and noticeably more expensive than the ferry.
Anywhere in the town centre is about CNY 5 by taxi, though drivers here often quote per person rather than per car — agree the total before you get in. The old town itself is entirely walkable, and walking is how you find the alleys.
Shopping
Guizhou has brewed good liquor for centuries, and Zhenyuan's Qingjiu is aged in natural limestone caves cut into the karst. Crystal clear, heavily aromatic, sweet on the finish. Buy it in the two pedestrian streets — Xinglong Street and Shuncheng Street.
Grown in Tianyin village in Duping township and sent to the imperial court for over 1,200 years. The altitude, sunshine hours and soil do the work; the picking and hand-processing do the rest. A genuinely local buy, not a tourist-shop invention.
A preserved mustard-green pickle first made by the Daoist priests of the Qinglong Cave temple, hence the name. Dark brown, strangely fragrant, and superb steamed with pork — it is the one Zhenyuan speciality that travels well in a suitcase.
You will smell it before you see it: sweet, sharp, drifting down the old street. Shopkeepers stretch the candy on an iron hook by the door, pulling and looping it in a performance that is half theatre, half sale. Buy it still warm — crisp outside, chewy within.
Practical
Zhenyuan is small, cheap and low-risk. The two things that will genuinely improve your trip are waterproofing and the willingness to haggle. Both apply all year round.
| Money | Rural Credit Cooperative and Postal Savings Bank branches are the easiest to find — bring a card for one of those. ICBC is here too, and bigger hotels and restaurants take UnionPay. Bank of China is not in town; you would have to go to Kaili. CNY 600–1,000 in cash comfortably covers two people for one or two days. |
|---|---|
| Weather & packing | Subtropical and wet, average 16.4°C, mild in winter and cool in summer. But 80% of the rain falls from May to October, so bring an umbrella plus rain covers for your pack and camera. Nights are cold even in summer — pack a warm layer. Non-slip walking or hiking shoes are essential; the lanes are wet stone. |
| Cash vs card | Cash still rules for small guesthouses, ferries, snacks and taxis. Cards work at larger hotels and restaurants only. Agree on taxi fares before departure, and expect to bargain on accommodation in peak season. |
| Opening hours | Qinglong Cave 8:00–16:00; Tiexi 8:00–17:30; Gaoguo River 9:00–16:00; Tianhou Palace and the old town sights generally 8:00–17:30 in summer and 8:00–17:00 in winter. Shining Screen Mountain is free before 8am — go early for the panorama anyway. |
| Altitude & health | Zhenyuan sits low, so altitude is a non-issue. Bring diarrhea medicine and motion-sickness pills — Guizhou's mountain roads are a rollercoaster, and buses hurtle around blind bends. Eat and drink cautiously on your first day if your stomach is sensitive. |
| Emergency numbers | Zhenyuan County People's Hospital, Wuyang town, 0855-5723518. Zhenyuan County Post Office, Xinglong Street, Wuyang town, 0855-5722261. Peace Village (Heping Cun) reception, 0854-3610516. |
| Watch out for | Zhenyuan is one of the few places in Qiandongnan with a real tourist trap, and it is religious. At Qinglong Cave, smiling men with an air of cultivation will invite you to burn incense and pray — at a steep price. If you are not religious, refuse firmly; if you are, remember they are not of your faith. Also: bargain for everything — food, lodging, transport, souvenirs. |
Background
Zhenyuan exists because of its position. Sitting where the Wu River cuts through the mountains, it was the choke point on the road between the central plains and Yunnan — the old saying goes that to hold Yunnan and Chu you must hold Zhenyuan, and to reach Guizhou you must first guard Zhenyuan. That earned it the nickname Key to Yunnan and Chu, Gateway to Eastern Guizhou. At its peak the garrison here numbered 28,000 soldiers, and the Four Officials Hall still honours Bai Qi, Wang Jian, Lian Po and Li Mu, the four generals of ancient China. From the Ming and Qing dynasties it grew into the political, military and commercial centre of eastern Guizhou, with eight great guild halls and twelve opera towers, some of which survive. Later it became the birthplace of China's heavy industry: the Qingxi Ironworks, a joint-stock venture set up under Li Hongzhang and Zhang Zhidong's Self-Strengthening Movement, predates the Hanyang works by three years, and its No. 1 steel ingot is still kept in town.
The Qinglong Cave complex is the clearest expression of Zhenyuan's character: a Buddhist cave where the Daoist immortal Zhang Sanfeng is honoured, a Confucian hall that gives its best room to Laozi, and a Daoist shrine whose first chamber belongs to Guanyin. Nobody here insists on a single doctrine. About 40 percent of the population belongs to one of 22 ethnic minorities — Miao, Dong and Tujia among them — which is why the food, the festivals and the villages around town feel so distinct. Look for the Dushu Dragon Boat Festival on the 25th to 27th of the fifth lunar month, the Liuyueliu Eating New Festival on the sixth day of the sixth month with its bullfighting and horse racing, and the Tujia Suona Festival on the eighth day of the eighth month, when a hundred suona horns play at once. The climate is mild all year — an average of 16.4°C, no harsh winter, no scorching summer — but 80 percent of the rain falls between May and October, so pack a rain cover for your bag and camera.
Further reading
Directed by Wang Jun, written by Hai Yan, 30 episodes, 2007
Filmed on location in Zhenyuan. A family saga that follows a boy into adulthood as he searches for the truth about his family, with the Jian River and the town's riverside streets standing in for his hometown. Watch it and you will recognise the ferries, the old lanes and the evening light on the water before you arrive.
Wu Jingzi, Qing dynasty, 56 chapters
Three chapters of this classic satirical novel are set in Zhenyuan, describing the manoeuvres of General Tang and the Miao leader Bie Zhuangyan against the backdrop of local life. The book is also the source of the famous story of Fan Jin passing the imperial exam. Read those three chapters and the town's strategic weight suddenly makes sense.
Yu Qiuyu
A rare case of a major Chinese writer devoting a whole set of essays to one region. The photographs are as much the point as the prose, and it is a good primer on the Miao and Dong villages around Zhenyuan before you head out to Baijing or Gaoguo River.
A Youduo
A Miao singer's love letter to the town — sweet, unhurried, and the perfect soundtrack for the drive in. If you are self-driving, queue it up as you come down the mountain road. For something rawer, try Tian Ge Shen Yun by Qiandongnan's indigenous singers, a collection of Miao and Dong songs recorded in the villages.
The questions visitors ask us most about Zhenyuan, answered plainly.
Prices and practical details are reviewed every month by our Beijing team and updated the day a rule changes.
Yes — one full day covers the old town, Qinglong Cave, the ancient lanes and the night lights; two days lets you add a Wuyang River boat trip or Shi Ping Shan. Three days opens up Gaoguo River rafting and the Baojing Dong village. Most travellers find 1–2 days is the sweet spot.
Trains are the easiest and safest way — Guiyang to Zhenyuan takes roughly 3–4 hours, and Kaili is the main transfer hub for onward connections to Xijiang and Libo. Driving is possible but the mountain roads are narrow, steep and slick after rain, so unless you are confident on switchbacks, take the train. From Zhenyuan station, a taxi into the old town costs about 5 yuan.
April to October is best, though 80% of the annual rain falls between May and October, so pack a rain cover for your bag and camera. Summer is cool enough that you rarely need air conditioning. Winter is cold and the town's heating is basic, but you get far fewer crowds and more genuine local encounters. The Dragon Boat Festival in early summer is the liveliest time to be here.
Sour fish hotpot is the dish — the sour broth comes in white (fermented rice water), red (wild tomato) and chili versions, and locals say skipping sour food for three days makes you stumble. Also try the three-flavour stinky tofu on Xinglong Street, rice tofu, Huaxi beef noodles, and the peanut-filled zongzi sold for 1 yuan on the old lanes.
Yes — the main one is at Qinglong Cave, where well-dressed men approach visitors to offer incense and blessings at inflated prices. If you are not religious, decline firmly; if you are, remember they are not your fellow worshippers. Otherwise Zhenyuan is refreshingly free of scams, but always agree on taxi fares before you get in, since some drivers charge per person rather than per trip.
Bring 600–1,000 yuan in cash for a couple's two-day stay — that covers everything comfortably. Rural credit unions and postal savings banks are easy to find, and larger hotels and restaurants take UnionPay cards, but there is no Bank of China in town (the nearest is in Kaili). Bargaining is expected on everything from rooms to souvenirs, so keep small notes handy.
Plan this trip
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Haikou
City guide · 12 tours
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.
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.
Zhangjiajie
City guide · 11 tours
Three thousand sandstone pillars straight out of Avatar, a glass skywalk bolted to a cliff, and a cable car that leaves from downtown.
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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