China Tourism: Regions in Brief

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Regions in Brief

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Beijing, Tianjin & Hébei

While there's much talk of getting to the Three Gorges on the Yángzi River before the area's partial disappearance, the real urgency is to see what little of the old Beijing is left before preparations for the 2008 Olympics deliver the final coup de grâce to what remains of its ancient housing and original Míng dynasty street plan. Whole city blocks can vanish at once, not gradually drowned over a period of years, but felled in the space of a few days, sometimes taking ancient, long-forgotten temples with them (although some of these are occasionally restored and reopened to public view).

But while Beijing suffers from being communism's showpiece for the outside world and victim of ersatz modernization, it still has far more to offer than several other Chinese cities put together, including some of China's most extravagant monuments, such as the Forbidden City. In addition, there's easy access to the surrounding province of Hébei with its sinuous sections of the Great Wall and vast tomb complexes.

The Northeast

Even if the Chinese no longer believe civilization ends at the Great Wall, most tourists still do. The frigid lands to the northeast, once known as Tartary or Manchuria, represent one of the least-visited and most challenging regions in China, and its last great travel frontier.

Despite industrialization, the provinces of Liáoníng, Jílín, and Heilóngjiang, and the northern section of Inner Mongolia, still claim China's largest natural forest, its most pristine grasslands, and one of its most celebrated lakes (Tian Chí). What makes the region unique, however, are the architectural remnants of the last 350 years -- early Qing palaces and tombs, incongruous Russian cupolas, and eerie structures left over from Japan's wartime occupation.

Around the Yellow River

This region comprises an area of northern China that includes Shanxi, Níngxià, parts of Shanxi (sometimes spelled Shaanxi), and Inner Mongolia, roughly following the central loop of the Yellow River north of Xi'an.

One of China's "cradles of civilization" and rich in history, the area lays claim to most of the country's oldest surviving timber-frame buildings and its oldest carved Buddhist grottoes, as well as Píngyáo, one of its best-preserved walled cities.

The Silk Routes

From the ancient former capital of Xi'an, famed for the modern rediscovery of the Terracotta Warriors, trade routes ran in all directions, but most famously (because they were given a clever name in the 19th century) west and northwest through Gansù and Xinjiang, and on through the Middle East. Under the control of Tibetan, Mongol, Indo-European, and Turkic peoples more than of Chinese, these regions are still populated with Uighurs, Tajiks, Kazakhs, Tibetans, and others, some in tiny oasis communities on the rim of the Taklamakan Desert which seem completely remote from China. The Silk Routes are littered with alien monuments and tombs, and with magnificent cave-temple sights such as Dunhuáng, which demonstrate China's import of foreign religions and aesthetics as much as the wealth generated by its exports of silk.

Eastern Central China

Eastern central China, between the Yellow River (Huáng Hé) and the Yángzi River (Cháng Jiang), is an area covering the provinces of Hénán, Shandong, Jiangsu, and Anhui. It is the area in which Chinese culture developed and flourished with little dilution or outside influence. Luòyáng was the capital of nine dynasties, Kaifeng capital of six, and Nánjing capital of eight. The hometown of China's most important philosopher, Confucius, is here, along with several of China's holiest mountains, notably Tài Shan and Huáng Shan, as well as that watery equivalent of the Great Wall, the Grand Canal.

Shànghai

Shànghai is the city China boosters love to cite as representing the country as a whole, but it in fact represents nothing except itself -- the country's wealthiest city, and with (if the government's figures are to be believed) the highest per-capita income. Look closer and you'll see that many of its shiny new towers are incomplete or unoccupied. But the sweep of 19th- and early-20th-century architecture along The Bund, which looks as if the town halls of two dozen provincial British cities have been transported to a more exotic setting, and the maze of Art Deco masterpieces in the French Concession behind the Bund, make Shànghai the mainland's top East-meets-West destination, with the restaurants and a more relaxed and open-minded atmosphere to match. Nearby Hángzhou and Suzhou offer some of China's most famous scenery.

The Southeast

South of Shànghai and the Yángzi River, the coastal provinces of Zhèjiang, Fújiàn, and Guangdong have always been China's most outward-looking. These towns, which boomed under the relatively open Táng dynasty and which were forced to re-open as "treaty ports" by the guns of the British in the 19th century, are also those most prosperous under the current "reform and opening" policy. But in between the famous names, smaller Shàoxing and Quánzhou have managed to preserve some of their charm. Xiàmén, connected to Hong Kong by sea, has a treasure trove of colonial-era shop-houses, and an island covered in foreign-style mansions. A short distance inland, rural life continues much as it did back in the Táng dynasty, and extraordinary collections of fortress-mansions, corridor bridges, and watchtowers have survived the destruction of the Cultural Revolution. A little further inland, the impoverished pottery-producing province of Jiangxi shows the two-speed nature of China's growth.

Hong Kong & Macau

Two sets of pencil-slim towers jostle for position on either side of a harbor, close as bristles on a brush. Between them, ponderous ocean-going vessels slide past puttering junks, and century-old ferries waddle and weave across their paths. The mixture of Asia's finest hotels, territory-wide duty-free shopping, incense-filled working temples, and British double-decker buses makes this city-state worth flying to Asia to see in its own right. Macau, a little bit of misplaced Mediterranean, is a short ferry ride away.

The Southwest

Encompassing the provinces of Yúnnán, Guìzhou, Guangxi, and Hainán Island, this region is home to some of China's most spectacular mountain scenery and three of Asia's mightiest rivers, resulting in some of the most breathtaking gorges and lush river valleys in the country.

Even more appealing is the fact that this region is easily the most ethnically diverse in China. Twenty-six of China's 56 officially recognized ethnic groups can be found in the southwest, from the Mosu in Lúgu Lake to the Dai in Xishuangbannà, from the Miáo around Kaili to the Dòng in Sanjiang, each with different architecture, dress, traditions, and colorful festivals.

The Yángzi River

In addition to shared borders, the landlocked provinces of Sìchuan, Húbei, and Húnán and the municipality of Chóngqìng have in common the world's third longest river, the Cháng Jiang ("Long River," aka Yángzi or Yangtze). The home of five holy Buddhist and/or Daoist mountains, this area contains some of China's most beautiful scenery, particularly in northern Sìchuan and northern Húnán.

Sìchuan deserves exploration using Chéngdu as a base, and the Húnán should be explored from Chángsha. If you're taking the Three Gorges cruise (available indefinitely despite what you may have heard), try to at least leave yourself a few days on either end to explore Chóngqìng and Wuhàn. And a day trip from Chóngqìng to the Buddhist grottoes at Dàzú is well worth the time.

The Tibetan World

The Tibetan plateau is roughly the size of western Europe, with an average elevation of 4,700m (15,400 ft.). Ringed by vast mountain ranges such as the Kunlun range to the north and the Himalayas, the region offers towering scenic splendors as well as some of the richest minority culture within modern China's borders. Lhasa, former seat of the Dalai Lamas, is dominated physically by the vast Potala Palace, and emotionally by the fervor of the pilgrims to the Jokhang Temple. Fewer than half of the world's Tibetans now live in what is called Tibet -- much Tibetan territory has now been allocated to neighboring Chinese provinces and particularly in Qinghai, where the authorities are less watchful and the atmosphere in both monasteries and on the streets more relaxed.

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China Tourism: Regions in Brief

Regions in Brief

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