Kina

The still fairly unknown Huanglong National Park (黄龙景区, Huánglóng Jǐngqū) is a stunning valley with terraces of coloured limestone ponds in blues, greens, oranges, yellows and white. The best time to come from is June to October, ideally during mild July and August. Outside of this period, lack of water in the pools significantly reduces the visual impact of the park.

Fujian (福建, Fújiàn) is an attractive coastal province with a long seafaring history. As a significant stop on the maritime Silk Road, its cities developed an easy cosmopolitan outlook and visitors are surprised by the traces of elsewhere in its architecture, food, language and people.

The centre of the Tibetan Buddhist world for over a millennium, Lhasa (ལྷ་ས་; 拉萨; Lāsà; literally the 'Place of the Gods') remains largely a city of wonders. Your first view of the red-and-white Potala Palace soaring above the Holy City raises goosebumps and the charming whitewashed old Tibetan quarter continues to preserve the essence of traditional Tibetan life. It is here in the Jokhang, an otherworldly mix of flickering butter lamps, wafting incense and prostrating pilgrims, and the encircling Barkhor pilgrim circuit, that most visitors first fall in love with Tibet.

The original city core and the sole part of Shanghai to pre-date the 1850s, the Old City (上海老城厢; Shànghăi Lăo Chéngxiāng) is a favourite with visitors hoping to glimpse ‘traditional’ China. Many of the older buildings have been replaced with modern apartment blocks, but there are still more temples here than in the rest of the city combined, and pockets are impregnated with atmosphere and shabby charm.

Historically, Suzhou (苏州, Sūzhōu) was synonymous with high culture and elegance, and generations of artists, scholars, writers and high society in China were drawn by its exquisite art forms and the delicate beauty of its gardens. Suzhou's historic sites have felt the effects of modern building booms, but the city still retains enough pockets of charm to warrant two to three days’ exploration on foot.

Surrounded by the Yellow Sea, Dalian (大连, Dàlián) is one of China's most cosmopolitan cities. Its temperate climate, clean air and early-20th-century architecture alone attract the attention of international travelers from the region. But the second-tier city's tree-lined streets and impressive, swimmable seaside beaches, flanked by an undulating walkway, combine to create a seductive effect on China-hardened travelers and first-time visitors on three-day visa-free stopovers.

Many travelers find themselves drifting into Hubei (湖北; Húběi) through the Three Gorges, the precipitous marvel that's a continuation of Chongqing's uniquely lush and hilly landscape. This classic trip down the Yangzi is the perfect introduction to Hubei's natural beauty.

How popular is this time-locked place? Lijiang’s (丽江, Lìjiāng) maze of cobbled streets, rickety (or rickety-looking, given gentrification) wooden buildings and gushing canals suck in over eight million people a year. So thick are the crowds in the narrow alleys that it can feel like they've all arrived at the same time.

Gingerly stepping along a trail swept with scree to allow an old fellow with a donkey to pass; resting atop a rock, exhausted, looking up to see the snow-shrouded peaks, then down to see the lingering rays dancing on the rippling waters a thousand metres below. That pretty much sums up Tiger Leaping Gorge (虎跳峡, Hǔtiào Xiá), long one of the great treks of southwest China. Add in modern development, power lines and water pipes that follow the high trail, and a few stretches of road walking: this is no longer wild nature, but the views are still grand and it's still worth the trip.

As the birthplace of Mao Zedong, Communist Party cadres might wax lyrical about the sacred standing of Hunan (湖南; Húnán) in the annals of Chinese history, but it's the province's dramatic scenery that is the real draw. A magnificent landscape of isolated mountain ranges and jagged peaks envelops more than 80% of the province. The most astonishing example is found at the phantasmagorical Zhangjiajie, one of China's most surreal national parks. Here, as in other parts of the province, geological marvels thrust up majestically from green vales fed by tributaries in the fertile Yangzi River basin.