City guide · Zhejiang
A thousand islands that did not exist sixty years ago, and the cleanest big-lake water in China.
Reviewed by our Beijing team Updated 2026-10-10
The short version
City guide
Photographs from the coast, and what other travellers wrote afterwards.
The water is the best in the country among the big lakes, and the name 'thousand islands under heaven' is deserved. One thousand and seventy-eight islands, each with its own posture and its own grace. — A traveller's note in the source guide
A traveller's note in the source guide
Come to Qiandao Lake and eat the big fish head, or do not call yourself someone who travels for food. Order a tureen of fish-head soup and you will be eating what is in the pot and thinking about what is still in the lake. — A traveller's note in the source guide
A traveller's note in the source guide
This is a landscape with a date on it. Sixty years ago there was no lake here, only the Xin'an River valley and two county towns. Then the dam went in, the water rose, and the hills behind it became islands — 1,078 of them, by the current count. Chun'an county town moved uphill in 1959, and the two older walled cities, He Cheng and Shicheng, went under with their gate towers and their eighteen hundred years still standing on the lake bed.
What replaced them is the cleanest large body of water in China, and the reason a bottled-water company could build a national brand on the sentence 'Nongfu Spring is a little sweet'. It is not a wilderness experience — this is a working reservoir on the Hangzhou–Qiandao Lake–Huangshan corridor, 129 km from Hangzhou, and it is set up for visitors.
Being honest about it helps: most of the developed islands carry recent attractions. There is a snake island with tens of thousands of snakes, a monkey island with six troops, a lock island, a pontoon bridge with a hundred-pound carp under it. Nobody comes for those individually. You come to be out on the water among a thousand of them, to climb Meifeng once for the overview, and then to eat — this is one of China's four big freshwater-fish bases and the first national organic-fish farm, and the fish head is the dish the whole region is known for.
The second day is where the county earns its keep. Qiuchuan village, with seventy per cent of its buildings Ming and Qing Huizhou houses, is free and has farmhouse beds at ¥50–60. The forest oxygen bar is ¥60 and fifteen minutes out of town. In summer there are eight different raft runs. And if you ride, the 185 km loop round the lake is one of the better long day-rides in the country.
Qiandao Lake
Seven things that are worth rearranging a day for.
Highlights
Of all China's big rivers and lakes, this water ranks first for quality. That is not a slogan — it is why a bottled-water company put its name on it. On a calm morning the lake goes glassy and the islands sit on it doubled, and you can see down further than you would expect from a boat.
The lake has been on the map for fifty-odd years. High ground became islands when the dam closed; two county cities with eighteen centuries of history are still standing on the bottom. It gives the place an odd, deliberate feel — brand-new scenery built out of very old country.
'Without climbing Meifeng you have not seen the real Qiandao Lake.' More than 300 islands from one platform, on a peninsula named for its scholar, from a hill named because five linked summits make the shape of a plum blossom. Autumn gives the best visibility; the cable car saves you the climb.
One of the country's four big freshwater-fish bases and the first national organic-fish farm. The dish is the head — braised or in soup, priced by size, with a broth that is rich and clean at the same time. Order it once at a real restaurant, not on a tour boat, where the guide says both the price and the cooking disappoint.
Seven hundred years old, in a valley with water running through it, about seventy per cent of it Ming and Qing Huizhou houses with carved beams and the waterside pavilions most village houses never had. The houses line the stream in the shape of the character for 'king', and ninety-five per cent of the villagers are surnamed Wang. Free, and farmhouse beds ¥50–60.
Para-sailing, water planes, jet skis, surf runners, speedboats, rubber boats, diving to swim with the fish — Wenxin Island is the base, and the range is the widest in the country. Add eight separate raft runs from April to October and a 185 km cycle loop, and the lake turns out to be an activity destination as much as a scenery one.
Suggested routes
The standard trip: one day on the islands, one day on the edges of the county.
The lake's own way of playing is islands plus water: cross between them by boat and walk within them. Start at Meifeng for the overview, then Moonlight Island, where four islets are joined by floating bridges and you can walk between them instead of sailing.
Shenlong Island is the snake island, with dozens of venomous and non-venomous species; Monkey Island is a monkey kingdom with six troops spread over the islets. Santan Island's fortress-inheritance buildings and its food are the surprise of the day.
Stops: Meifeng IslandMoonlight IslandShenlong IslandMonkey IslandSantan Island
Start in the forest oxygen bar, fifteen minutes out of town, where old trees and streams fill the air with the negative ions and plant volatiles that make the place worth its name.
Then go to Qiuchuan, in Langchuan township. The Huizhou houses are in good condition — white walls and dark tiles, heavy where they should be, nimble where a stream runs past. Stay the night in a village farmhouse and eat there.
Stops: Forest oxygen barQiuchuan village
Only one day? This one has nature, culture, religion and dinner in it.
Go to the central zone first. 'Without climbing Meifeng you have not seen the real Qiandao Lake' — the viewing platform is the photographic spot, so take the cable car up and play on the grass slide on the way down.
Then Longshan Island, for the Half-Acre Pond, the Stone Gorge Academy and the Hai Rui shrine, which together carry the deep Xin'an culture of this county. Have lunch on Longshan.
Stops: Meifeng IslandLongshan Island
Cross to the southeast zone. Huangshanjian is the tallest island in the Pearl chain and the second great overview: more than ninety islands below you, strung out like pearls, with a deep gorge running between it and Xianshan to the southeast.
Finish at Mishan, 0.36 sq km of Zen — the island where the story of the three monks and no water to drink is set, with a temple still busy with worshippers. Then back to town for a proper fish-head dinner.
Stops: HuangshanjianMishan IslandFish-head dinner
Two days for the lake and its neighbourhood, one for the outer county.
Start on Moonlight Island for the romance, then Longshan for the Half-Acre Pond, the Stone Gorge Academy and the Hai Rui legacy. Eat on Longshan, and finish at the snake island.
Stops: Moonlight IslandLongshan IslandShenlong Island
Take the cable car or walk up Huangshanjian in the morning for the island chain. Then Mishan for the temple — a good place to sit down after the climb — lunch in the scenic area, then Guihua Island, named for the wild osmanthus growing out of the karst cracks, and finally Tianchi to feed the birds.
Stops: HuangshanjianMishan IslandGuihua IslandTianchi Island
Spend the morning in the Qiandao Lake stone forest, one of China's four great stone forests and called the first of them in east China — crawl the labyrinth, climb the rock faces, pass through the stone doors and squeeze along the fissures, quite possibly ending up back where you started.
After two and a half days on the move, spend the last afternoon breathing in the forest oxygen bar.
Stops: Stone forestForest oxygen bar
Sights
The overview
On the Scholar Peninsula at the west end of the central zone, named because five linked hills make the shape of a plum blossom in flower. Climb to the viewing platform and more than 300 islands of every size lie below you — it is the best high viewpoint on the lake, and the local saying is that without climbing Meifeng you have not seen what Qiandao Lake actually is.
Tip Ride up and walk or slide down. The classic version is the cable car up and the grass slide down, which is more fun than it sounds and cheaper than the return ticket.
The culture island
Longshan has been a noted place in western Zhejiang for centuries — the local rhyme runs 'the iron well at Tong Bridge, Little Gold Hill, the Stone Gorge Academy, living Longshan'. The island lies 5.5 km from Qiandao Lake town and is named for a ridge shaped like a dark dragon. It carries the Hai Rui shrine, the Stone Gorge Academy, the Half-Acre Pond and a bell tower, and is the lake's signature cultural sight.
Tip Find the 'longevity' stele. Hai Rui built the character out of four others — birth, mother, seven, ten — and it still reads as longevity when you turn it upside down.
Walk the bridges
Originally Five-Dragon Island, facing Qiandao Lake town across the water and the best-known cluster on the lake: Lock Island, Bird Island, the Garden of True Delight and Strange-Stone Island joined into one by three pontoon bridges — Fish-Delight, Lucky and Scholar. You can abandon the boat and walk between the islands, which is the whole point.
Tip Buy the ¥10 add-on for the Scholar Bridge and the lock museum only if you care; the bridges and the carp are free with the through-ticket and are the better part of it.
The second overview
In the Pearl island chain, Huangshanjian is the highest island in it. Look northwest and ninety-odd islands lie below you like pearls dropped on water; look southeast and a deep gorge runs between Huangshanjian and Xianshan; look southwest and the open lake runs to the horizon with Laoshan Island hazy in it. This is the earliest-developed part of the lake and, for many, the best natural scenery on it.
Tip Locals say the islands below Huangshanjian arrange themselves into the shape of a character. Find it before you look it up.
Zen and stone pools
Mishan is 0.36 sq km of temple and legend — this is where the story of the three monks and no water to carry is set, and the Mishan Chan Temple still draws worshippers. 'A blue lake and green hills hide an old temple' is the traditional description. Tianchi, also called Gemstone Hill, a kilometre north, has seven man-made stone pools on its summit: the Southern Song quarried the tea-garden stone here for palaces, stelae and arches in Lin'an, and the pits filled with water and became the Heavenly Pools.
Tip Mishan is the quietest island in the developed group. If the animal islands have worn you out, this is where to sit down.
The built ones
Shenlong Island is the snake island — dozens of species, venomous and not, in a display the guide calls a scroll of humans and snakes dancing together. Monkey Island, main island of the Yunmeng chain and more than a kilometre from its neighbours, is a monkey kingdom: two main troops, short-tailed macaques and rhesus, with a contact village, an education gallery and a trained-monkey arena. Guihua Island is the oldest developed sight on the lake, named for the wild osmanthus growing out of its karst fissures — genuine karst, fragrant in season, with paths that twist out of sight.
Tip Take these for what they are — small, built, and good with children. On Monkey Island, throw the food down rather than offering it; they bite.
Wetland in the southwest
In the southwest zone, 42 km from Qiandao Lake town and about 40 minutes by the Qianfen road, where islands and inlets interlock to make the 'lake within an island, island within a lake' that gives the place its name — the only lake-type wetland on Qiandao. Beyond the scenery there is a full programme: a sightseeing bus, an electric boat, a big-pot communal meal, an old film show, a reconstructed Educated Youth-era village, a water park, field archery, fishing, a tofu workshop, a tea house, and catching fish in the mud.
Tip This is the best single answer to 'the islands are built, what is not?' Go for the wetland and the old-film evening, not for the activities list.
The best thing on land
In Langchuan township, seven hundred years old, with about seventy per cent of its buildings Ming and Qing Huizhou houses — carved and painted beams, and the waterside pavilions, towers and fish pools that most village houses do not have. Seen from outside, the village is narrow at the mouth and wide in the belly, which is classic fengshui. A clear stream runs right through it, the houses lining it in the shape of the character for 'king' — and it happens that ninety-five per cent of the villagers are surnamed Wang.
Tip Stay the night. Arriving with the day-trippers and leaving with them misses the one thing a 700-year-old village has that an island does not — an evening.
The outer county
The Qiandao Lake stone forest is one of China's four great stone forests and called the first of them in east China — strange rock, cliffs, old paths and spirit caves, the peaks in shapes people call a natural animal museum. The forest oxygen bar sits on the edge of the southeast zone by national road 320, fifteen minutes from town: ancient trees, streams and waterfalls, air full of negative ions and plant volatiles. Jiupaojie, in Pingmen township 70 km out, is named for its nine waterfalls, whose roar gives the place its name; its villagers are largely descended from Wang Xizhi, and the poor roads have kept it unusually intact.
Tip If you only have one outer day, take Qiuchuan. If you have two, add the stone forest — it is the most surprising of the three and the least advertised.
Activities
The widest range in China
Wenxin Island is the base: para-sailing and water planes overhead, surf runners, jet skis, speedboats and rubber boats on the surface, and diving to swim with the fish below. For relaxed options there are the Forrest Gump boat and the couples' boat. It is the fullest water-sports menu in the country, and the reason the lake turns out to suit people who thought they were coming to look at scenery.
Tip Go on a weekday morning. Prices and queues both improve, and the water is calmest before the afternoon wind gets up.
Eight runs
Between April and October the hills and gorges round the lake run with hundreds of streams, and eight rafting operations have been set up on them, each with its own character. Jiulongxi is the gentle one, 3.88 km at the foot of Jinzijian, Chun'an's second-highest peak, and the pick for a relaxed drift. Jiupaojie claims to be China's number-one waterfall raft — narrow bed, big drop, fast water, deep pools. Jinfeng Gorge runs 800 metres through a tunnel. Wuqiangxi is the slow one, with natural pools, and the right choice for children and older travellers.
Tip Bring a dry set of clothes and a pair of plastic flip-flops to change into afterwards. And leave anything valuable behind — if you capsize, neither the operator nor the insurer will pay for cash or phones lost.
For riders
The lake has drawn a growing crowd of serious and amateur cyclists, and riding the Qiandao Lake loop is both a challenge and a pleasure: quiet inlets, long climbs that test the legs, old villages, islands and still water, cloud and light. The route runs from the tourism pier along Menggu Road and the Chunyang road, over Jiangbu bridge, through Anyang, Dashi, Fengshuling and Fenkou, then along the Qianfen road through Langchuan, Jiangjia and Jieshou and back over the Qiandao Lake bridge.
Tip Ride it over two days and sleep at Jiangjia or Fenkou. Doing 185 km in one push means riding the best sections in the dark.
The lit shore
A different version of the lake: from a boat at night, the shoreline lights come on and the whole thing reads as lake-town rather than reservoir. Some say water is lovelier by night than by day, with the lamps along the bank and the water moving under them.
Tip Do it on your first evening rather than the last — it is the best orientation you can get for what the town actually is.
Food
The dish the whole place is known for, and the one to order first. Cooked every way — braised, or in soup — and priced by the size of the head. The broth is slick and rich without being heavy, the flesh tender and clean, and the plate comes loaded. No visit counts without one.
The dried bamboo comes from the high country of northern Chun'an: wild young shoots, steamed and then baked, which makes them dark-coloured, strongly flavoured and, locally, a 'health vegetable' said to sharpen appetite and clear heat. Stewed with the organic fish as the main ingredient and Tianping stone-shoots as the partner, it is the most local combination on the menu — smooth fish, fragrant shoots, thick pure broth.
The richer version: the head cooked with eight additions, which varies by kitchen but always means a deeper, more layered broth. Order it if you have four or more people and want something more substantial than the plain soup.
The lake's fish beyond the head. Mandarin fish steamed plain, because the flesh is good enough not to need anything, and fish balls in a clear soup that tastes of the water rather than of seasoning. Both are the light counterpoint to the rich head.
The mountain side of the menu. Wild boar ribs, crisp and salty with pepper, and a soup of silver fish — tiny, pale and sweet, the lake's smallest catch and one of its best.
Sold in every market in Chun'an. Glossy, pliant enough to roll without cracking, with a flavour that keeps going after the chew. It is said the Qianlong emperor made it tribute on his tour of the south, and the cakes are still stamped with a character from his reign.
Clean, sweet and genuinely good, and the right thing to drink with a plate of pepper-salt ribs. Two bottles on the table are normal. It is one of those local beers that does not travel, which is a reason to drink it here.
Where to eat
The classic fish head
The position is the point — the windows look straight out over Qiandao Lake, so you eat with the view in front of you. The fish head comes in several styles; the small thick-soup fish head is ¥368 and is in fact a very large tureen, enough for five people. This is the one everyone names.
Where locals go
A local favourite near the passenger pier: snacks on the ground floor, stir-fried dishes upstairs, good value and honest cooking. Order the country free-range chicken casserole, tea-scented wild rabbit, red trout, the fish-and-goat pot, or the spicy fried crab.
Farmhouse cooking
Entirely farmhouse cooking, well made, and busy for that reason. The free-range chicken soup is the dish to order — and note the local touch, chicken blood in the soup, which is how Chun'an farmhouses make it.
Haggle first
Qiandao Lake town has three stall clusters: the Qiandao Lake night market by the passenger pier, the Xiyuan market by Xiyuan pier and the Dongguahu market on Xin'an North Road. Prices are about the same as a mid-range restaurant rather than cheap, so you must haggle — and keep track of what you were quoted for each dish, or the bill will surprise you.
Cheapest and best value
Qiuchuan has farmhouse places offering beds and food at ¥50–60 a day per person. One of them, Waiwaijia outside town, is a five-storey house with small rooms that are at least not damp — most hotels around the lake are — a private bathroom, a shower and a bit of space to dry clothes. The food won a gold medal in the local farmhouse cooking competition, and bighead carp runs ¥28 a jin, about ¥50 a head.
The one warning
Do not eat the organic fish head on the tour boats. The guide is blunt about it: have it in town, where both the price and the cooking are better. The boats charge for the convenience of being on the water, not for the kitchen.
Where to stay
Read this first
Qiandao Lake town is well supplied at every level. Farmhouse inns cover the budget end and are genuinely cheap; the most popular choice is a lake-view hotel in town, which offers the best value at around ¥300. The resorts each occupy their own island, with every hotel facility and a full set of water sports, and they are expensive — New Century and Tianqingdao are the two best known, running into four figures. Wenxin Island and Phoenix are inside the central zone, one island each, at ¥300–700.
The famous one
Built against the hill and over the lake, in a position that is hard to fault — the view from the hilltop beats the shoreline by a distance. Rooms are comfortable and well equipped, large, and the whole lake is visible from the window. The dining room serves a very good fish head, peacocks stroll the grounds and the service is attentive. Expensive, but at five-star rates it is defensible.
The best rooms
On Xianshan Peninsula, with the best setting of the lot — the hilltop view is in a different class from the shoreline. Rooms are large, comfortable and fully equipped, with the whole lake visible from the window.
The value choice
Outside town at Langdaling, a five-storey house with small rooms — but not damp, which most hotels around the lake are — a private bathroom, a shower and a little space to hang washing. The food is the reason to stay: gold medal in the local farmhouse cooking competition, bighead carp at ¥28 a jin, about ¥50 a head.
Something different
Sleeping aboard the Count Cruise is the unusual option: six decks with leisure, dining and entertainment facilities and a large open-air stage garden, moored at the tourism pier. A genuinely different way to spend a night on the lake rather than beside it.
Cheap and clean
Shangkeyou sits on the lake shore with lake views from the rooms, 600 m from Qiandao Lake Square and a short walk to Xiushui Street. Rooms are large, clean and fully equipped. Jiupao Inn, out in the Jiupaojie scenic area 68 km from town, is the cheap base for that corner — clean, free wifi all day, helpful service and a view of the scenic area from the window.
Shopping
The lake is full of fish of every size and it is the country's first organic-fish farm. Sun-dried or baked, salted or plain, some of it a metre long and hung up in the shops in rows — a genuinely striking sight. There are also simply-packed versions, cut into sections and sealed, which keep for months. The easiest thing to take home from Chun'an.
Grown in cloud and mist on the high hills around the lake, originally sold as Qiandao Lake Dragon Well. Thick, straight, flat leaves with white down, green with visible tip, a lasting clean aroma, a yellow-green liquor and a full, brisk taste. The tea visitors like most.
Also called small walnuts or small hickory nuts, a rare Chinese tree oilseed and one of the plant world's survivors — only Chun'an and Lin'an grow it, and Chun'an produces forty per cent of the national crop. Unsaturated fat runs above ninety-five per cent, easily absorbed and, by local account, protective against heart disease.
Chun'an's persimmon: large, and with a better texture than most. Buy them in season, and if you are driving, buy them at a market in town rather than at a scenic-area shop.
The story is that Hai Rui, as magistrate of Chun'an, noticed the stone of Dragon-Eye Hill here was jet-black and easy to work, sent someone to learn the craft, and named the resulting inkstone the Qingxi dragon inkstone. The stone is hard and fine-grained: it mists when you breathe on it and never dries out, and it is rated with the Duan and She inkstones.
Local craft with more than 1,700 years behind it, in patterns called 'dragon and phoenix in auspicious harmony', 'a hundred birds paying court', 'golden rooster sporting with chrysanthemum'. Used to decorate rooms and clothing, and it carries a genuinely old feeling.
The Qiandao Lake tourism products street runs along Xiushui Street at the tourism pier: lake on one side, speciality and craft shops on the other. Yejiaojiao Green Food City is the largest and fullest speciality supermarket in town, with several branches, and its tribute-fish and kudzu-starch lines have won national food awards — pricier than a market, but good.
Getting around
There is no airport at the lake. Hangzhou Xiaoshan (HGH) is the usual arrival and there are three ways on from it, in ascending order of cost: public transport at ¥65 all in, a taxi to the coach station, or a chartered van all the way.
Do not book the Qiandao Lake railway station. It is not at the lake — it is at Maozhuyuan in neighbouring Jiande city, and runs two trains a day to Jinhua and Yiwu. Boat connections to Maozhuyuan leave Xiyuan pier at 06:30, 08:50, 10:30 and 14:00, returning at 08:30, 10:40, 12:20 and 16:00. Everyone else takes the train to Hangzhou and coaches from there.
The ordinary way in. Hangzhou West station to Qiandao Lake long-distance station, every 30 minutes from 06:00 to 18:50, about two hours, ¥60; returns 05:20–18:20. Shanghai's south long-distance station runs three departures a day. Huangshan has one through coach each way with the New National Line.
The lake has 23 navigable routes totalling 341 km and 127 piers of every size, reaching northwest to Shexian in Anhui. The public cruise boats run bus-style at ¥45; the passenger boats to Shendu are the budget way to cross; and the long-distance pier handles high-speed boats to Jiangjia, Fenkou, Weiping and Zitong.
Driving from Hangzhou is 129 km by the Hangxinjing expressway and its Qiandao Lake spur, about 90 minutes; from Shanghai it is about 316 km; from Huangshan about 175 km with only two toll stations. In town, nine bus routes run at ¥1, including K004 direct to the new tourism pier, 06:00–22:00 every 10–15 minutes. Taxis here are close to the cheapest in China: ¥2 a head on the main roads, ¥2 more for a detour through the lanes, ¥5 to start the meter further out, and if the taxi is not full the driver will stop and take you anyway.
Tips
The boats have run on a bus-style timetable since 2012 with fixed departures and fixed fares. Every independent-boatman arrangement, every haggled price and every 'take you to the islands' offer described in older material is out of date.
There are touts who tell you that you do not need a ticket. They take your money, put you on a boat, and the boat goes somewhere that is not the main scenic area. Buy at the gate.
If you want the through-ticket to cover two days, you must apply to the scenic-area staff before your first trip out, with your ID, and pay ¥10 a head. Do it on arrival — you cannot do it retroactively.
The guide is blunt: the organic fish head on the tourist boats disappoints on both price and cooking. Have it at a restaurant in Qiandao Lake town or at a farmhouse in Qiuchuan, where a whole bighead runs ¥28 a jin.
A sun umbrella, a hat and sunglasses are worth packing. There is no shade on the main peaks, and the glare off the water doubles the exposure. In April and May bring rain gear too.
Do not tease the monkeys or feed them from your hand — drop the food on the ground. They bite, and the warning is in the guide because it happens.
Practical
The lake is the reason to come and the fish is the reason to stay. Everything else — the animal islands, the lock bridges, the souvenir streets — is optional.
| Through-ticket | ¥150 from 1 March to 30 November; ¥120 from 1 December to the end of February; students half price. Covers any island in any lake zone, not the outlying sights. Two-day use: register first, ¥10 a head |
|---|---|
| Cruise boats | ¥45 a head, ¥25 children 1.2–1.5 m. Central zone 08:00–09:00, 10:00–10:40, 12:00–13:00; southeast zone 08:40, 09:20, 10:00, 11:00, 13:00 |
| Charter | Luxury yacht ¥150 a head based on six; leisure yacht ¥2,500 a trip; whole boat from ¥1,350 based on thirty, each extra person ¥45. No whole-boat charters on golden-week or high-season weekends |
| Cable cars | Meifeng: up ¥25 adult / ¥15 child, down ¥20 / ¥10, return ¥40 / ¥20. Huangshanjian: ¥50 return, ¥30 one way |
| Outlying sights | Longchuan Bay ¥100 season / ¥80 winter, plus ¥20 internal transport; stone forest ¥100; forest oxygen bar ¥60; Jiupaojie ¥80; Qiuchuan village free |
| Rafting | Jiulongxi ¥158, Jinfeng Gorge ¥108, Jiupaojie ¥100, Wuqiangxi ¥100 — April to October |
| Best months | Sep–Nov, 12–18°C, least rain, best visibility. Annual mean 17°C, extremes 41.8°C and −7.6°C, 1,430 mm of rain over 155 days |
| Useful numbers | Tourist hotline 400-8811-988 or 0571-64831113 / 65022530; central-zone pier 0571-64816244; southeast-zone pier 0571-64881959; boat enquiries 0571-64812799; complaints 0571-24810000; taxi complaints 96520 |
| Hospitals | Chun'an First People's Hospital, Qiandao Lake town, 0571-64813550; Chun'an Second People's Hospital, Fenkou, 0571-64851260 |
Background
Chun'an was established as a county in the thirteenth year of the Eastern Han Jian'an era, more than 1,800 years ago, and long called itself 'fine hills and clear water, a land of documents'. Its old county seat, built by He Qi in 209 and therefore also called He Cheng, was a strategic town on the Zhejiang–Anhui border. The old seat of Sui'an county, moved here in 621 under Tang Wude, was called Shicheng and had eight gate towers. In 1959 both were submerged to build the Xin'an River reservoir, and the present county town of Qiandao Lake was moved from He Cheng in October of that year.
That is the fact underneath the scenery: this is a lake with two drowned cities in it, and the migration that followed broke the local culture almost completely. How to carry a tradition forward after that has been the county's standing problem ever since. The people who are properly Chun'an live in stone-tiled houses, wear hemp-embroidered skirts, listen to Mu opera, watch bamboo-horse dances and eat thin, crisp, fragrant corn cakes — and sing, in the local rhyme, 'feet on the white-charcoal fire, hands round a corn cake, next to the emperor it is me.'
Qiandao Lake sits between 118°58′ and 119°17′ east and 29°31′ and 29°41′ north, at the northern edge of the subtropical monsoon belt. The high forest cover and the mass of water moderate it: warm and humid, four distinct seasons, annual mean 17°C, extremes of 41.8°C and −7.6°C, 1,430 mm of rain across 155 days. It is the main component of the Fuchun River–Xin'an River–Qiandao Lake national scenic area.
It is 129 km from Hangzhou and about 140 from Huangshan, which is why it sits as the middle link on the famous city–water–mountain route, and why it is reachable from Shanghai, Jiangsu, Anhui, Jiangxi and Fujian. It is a reservoir less than sixty years old that has become the defining landscape of a county with eighteen centuries of history behind it.
The lake has 23 navigable routes totalling 341 km and 127 piers, running northwest into Anhui. It is one of the country's four big freshwater-fish bases and its first certified organic-fish farm, which is why the fish head is on every menu and why 'Chun' is a brand rather than a place. Its tea, walnuts, persimmons and dried fish supply the souvenir trade on Xiushui Street.
It also carries the county's own folk arts, which the migration nearly took with it: the bamboo-horse dance, Mu opera — one of China's 315 local operatic forms, found only in Chun'an, with simple plots, comic and farcical by preference, sung to the erhu in Huguang, three-foot and miscellaneous tunes — and the local 'three carvings' in wood, stone and brick. Come for the water and the fish if you like. The reason to come back is that there is a real, old, slightly damaged culture underneath the resort.
The questions visitors ask us most about Qiandao Lake, answered plainly.
Prices and practical details are reviewed every month by our Beijing team and updated the day a rule changes.
It is a through-ticket: ¥150 from 1 March to 30 November, ¥120 from 1 December to the end of February, students half price, valid for any island in any lake zone — but not for the outlying sights such as the stone forest, the forest oxygen bar or Longchuan Bay. To use it over two days you must register with the scenic-area staff before your first trip out and pay a ¥10 per-person fee.
¥45 a head on the public cruise boats, ¥25 for children 1.2–1.5 m. They have run on a bus-style timetable since 2012 — central-zone departures 08:00–09:00 and 10:00–10:40 in the morning, 12:00–13:00 in the afternoon; southeast zone at 08:40, 09:20, 10:00, 11:00 and 13:00. Chartering: a luxury yacht is ¥150 a head based on six people, a leisure yacht ¥2,500 a trip, and a whole boat ¥1,350 based on thirty.
Meifeng for the view, Longshan for the Hai Rui shrine and the Stone Gorge Academy, Moonlight Island for the floating bridges and the giant carp. In the southeast zone, Huangshanjian for the second-best overview and Mishan for the temple. Skip the animal islands unless you specifically want them — they are the most obviously built of the lot.
Coach from Hangzhou West station, every 30 minutes from 06:00 to 18:50, about two hours, ¥60. From Hangzhou Xiaoshan airport, take the airport bus to the railway station (¥20), bus 49 to the West coach station (¥2) and the coach (¥43), or a taxi to the coach station for about ¥180. Do not book the Qiandao Lake railway station — it is at Maozhuyuan in Jiande, with two trains a day to Jinhua and Yiwu, and it is not at the lake.
The fish head first: braised or in soup, priced by size, with a broth that is slick, rich and full of aromatics. Then wild bamboo-shoot stew with fish head, eight-treasure fish head, steamed mandarin fish, clear-soup fish balls, wild boar ribs in pepper salt and silver-fish soup. Chayuan dried tofu, stamped with a character from the Qianlong reign because he made it tribute, is in every market. And the local beer is genuinely good.
September to November: 12–18°C, the least rain, and the best visibility from Meifeng, where you can count more than 300 islands. April and May are also good but wetter — bring rain gear. Winter is the underrated option: the water is at its clearest, there are no crowds, and a standard room falls to ¥50–60, about two-thirds below high season.
Yes, if you take the 'essence' route: Meifeng and Longshan in the central zone in the morning, Huangshanjian and Mishan in the southeast in the afternoon, and a fish-head dinner in town. You will see the lake rather than the county. Two days is meaningfully better because the second one gets you Qiuchuan village, which is the best thing in Chun'an that is not water.
Yes, and there is a trick for it. Instead of the cruise ticket, buy the ¥15 passenger-boat ticket from Qiandao Lake pier to Shendu — five hours across the lake, the same water, arriving in Anhui where you can pick up a bus to Shexian every half hour. You do not get to land on any islands, but the guide's own view is that most of what is on them was built recently anyway.
Plan this trip
The same places, with a driver, an English-speaking guide and the tickets already bought.
City guides
Dalian
City guide · 15 tours
The Northern Pearl — China's most romantic coastal city.
Shenyang
City guide · 12 tours
Where the Qing dynasty began — an imperial palace, a warlord's mansion and the cheapest good food in the northeast.
Changbai Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
A volcano on the North Korean border, a jade-green crater lake at 2,189 m, and hot springs on the way down.
Kunming
City guide · 12 tours
China's Spring City — a mild plateau capital of flowers, markets and the Stone Forest, with gulls on the lake in winter.
Dali
City guide · 12 tours
A walled Bai town between a 4,000 m mountain and a great lake — wind, flowers, snow and moon, and life at a slower speed.
Shuhe
City guide · 12 tours
The quiet version of Lijiang — a Tea Horse Road village of canals, stone bridges and slow afternoons, 4 km from the crowds.
Lijiang
City guide · 12 tours
A UNESCO Naxi old town of canals and cobbles beneath a 5,596 m snow mountain — the cultural heart of north-west Yunnan.
Xiamen
City guide · 12 tours
A subtropical island city of temples, fishing-village lanes and the best street food in Fujian — with the car-free islet of Gulangyu a 20-minute ferry away.
Gulangyu
City guide · 12 tours
A car-free island of colonial villas, pianos and cats, twenty minutes off Xiamen — and the one place where the trick is simply to stay the night.
Fuzhou
City guide · 12 tours
A 2,200-year-old capital of banyan trees and mountains-within-the-city, where the Ming lanes of Sanfang Qixiang meet the dockyard that built China's modern navy.
Lugu Lake
City guide · 12 tours
A 2,680 m lake on the Yunnan–Sichuan border, home to China's last matrilineal people, pig-trough canoes and a great deal of doing nothing.
Xishuangbanna
City guide · 12 tours
China's tropical south — rainforest, wild elephants, Dai villages and the Mekong, wrapped around the gateway city of Jinghong.
Shangri-La
City guide · 12 tours
A Tibetan town at 3,300 m in Yunnan's Diqing prefecture — monasteries, grassland, prayer wheels and cold thin air.
Nanchang
City guide · 12 tours
Jiangxi's 'hero city' on the Gan River — one great Tang pavilion, a 160-metre Ferris wheel, and the best claypot soup you will eat in China.
Hefei
City guide · 12 tours
Anhui's 2,000-year-old capital: the hometown of China's model judge, a moat-turned-garden ring, and the fast rail gateway to Huangshan.
Hongcun
City guide · 12 tours
A 900-year-old Hui village laid out as an ox, with water running to every door and a mirror-still crescent pond at its heart.
Wuhan
City guide · 12 tours
Three towns, two rivers and the best breakfast in China — a huge, blunt river city of bridges, lakes and cheap, brilliant street food.
Changsha
City guide · 12 tours
Hunan's loud, young capital: a 3,000-year-old city that eats chilli-hot food, stays up all night and treats foot massage as a civic duty.
Fenghuang Ancient Town
City guide · 12 tours
The stilt-house river town of Shen Congwen's 'Border Town' — glowing lanterns, stepping stones and the best two nights in western Hunan.
Lushan
City guide · 12 tours
A cloud-wrapped granite mountain with a Victorian hill station on top, waterfalls in three tiers, and the mist that Su Shi said you could never see through.
Wuyuan
City guide · 12 tours
China's 'most beautiful countryside' — dozens of white-walled Huizhou villages strung along streams and terraced into the hills, and two weeks a year of gold.
Mount Heng (Hengshan, Hunan)
City guide · 12 tours
The South Great Peak: a pilgrimage mountain of 72 summits where the temples run all the way to the top, and the sunrise over the cloud sea is the whole point.
Huangshan
City guide · 12 tours
Yellow Mountain: 82 granite peaks of twisted pines and grotesque rock, a sea of cloud that changes by the hour, and hot springs at the foot.
Wudang Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
The Taoist first mountain of China — a gilded bronze hall on a 1,612 m summit, temples hung off cliff faces, and the birthplace of tai chi.
Luoyang
City guide · 12 tours
Thirteen dynasties, 100,000 Buddhas carved into a river cliff, China's first Buddhist temple — and a whole city that turns peony-pink every April.
Yuntai Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
A UNESCO geopark in Henan where red-stone gorges squeeze a river to a slot, a 314 m waterfall drops in one plunge, and every path leads to another pool.
Rizhao
City guide · 12 tours
A low-key Shandong beach town where the sun rises straight out of the Yellow Sea, the sand runs 60 km and a seafood dinner costs less than a coffee in Shanghai.
Yantai
City guide · 12 tours
A northern Shandong port of fairy-tale cliffs, wine cellars and long golden beaches — where emperors once hunted the elixir of life and China's wine industry still begins.
Lianyungang
City guide · 12 tours
A working Jiangsu port with a myth in the middle of it — the Flower-Fruit Mountain of Journey to the West, a sea causeway to a big island beach, and some of the cheapest seafood on the coast.
Sanqing Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
A vertical forest of granite pillars in Jiangxi — the Python Out of the Mountain, the Goddess of the East Sea, two cable cars and a cliff-hugging walkway at 1,660 metres.
Tianjin
City guide · 12 tours
Beijing's port city next door — a river of 24 bridges, 2,000 colonial villas, and the best street breakfast in northern China.
Datong
City guide · 12 tours
A frontier capital of carved Buddhas — the Yungang Grottoes, a temple pinned to a cliff, and the oldest wooden tower in China.
Taiyuan
City guide · 12 tours
Shanxi's provincial capital and noodle heartland — the spring of Jinci, two Ming pagodas, and a museum that explains the whole province.
Pingyao
City guide · 12 tours
China's best-preserved ancient walled town — a Ming wall, the first Chinese bank, and two temples of painted clay just outside the gates.
Wutai Mountain
City guide · 12 tours
China's foremost Buddhist mountain — fifty-plus temples in one valley, crowned by five flat-topped peaks up to 3,058 m.
Hulunbuir
City guide · 12 tours
China's finest grassland — a 263,000 km² sweep of steppe, birch forest and border river, best driven with the windows down.
The Forbidden City
City guide · 12 tours
Beijing's 600-year imperial palace — 8,700 rooms behind a 72-hectare wall, and the largest surviving wooden palace complex on earth.
Sanya
City guide · 12 tours
China's only true winter-sun coast — four very different bays, a coral island and a 108 m sea Buddha, all at 18° north.
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.
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.
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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