Huzhou lures visitors with its history, scenery
Print Edition
HUZHOU in eastern China’s Zhejiang Province has been historically associated with both wealth and culture.
It is also blessed with a rich natural heritage.
Leaning on the Taihu Lake, Huzhou attracts visitors with its sublime portraits of nature — from Anji, the bamboo haven, to Moganshan, a new favorite of Shanghai’s bourgeoisie.
Right now, both suburban and urban areas closer to the heart of Huzhou City are seeing a revival in tourism.
Tucked away in the city’s Nanxun District, the thousand-year-old Digang Village (荻港村, literally “reed harbor village”) sits peacefully with its black-tile-roofed houses surrounded by water.
It can be hard to imagine that this humble village, with a population of just a bit over 4,000, once used to be a prosperous trading hub. With its proximity to the Grand Canal, which runs 1,794 kilometers from Beijing to Hangzhou, Digang Village neighbors Shanghai to the east, Hangzhou to the south, Huzhou, Wuxi and Suzhou to the north.
In the early 20th century, shops of all kinds lined the Old Street, behind the village’s 500-meter riverside corridor. Also scattered on the stretch were 13 teahouses — the most popular hangouts among locals at that time.
Today, only one of these teahouses remains. Juhuayuan (聚华园) has been around for more than a century, virtually a living fossil from the past.
A cup of tea here costs only 1 yuan (14 US cents). You can laze away the entire day with generous refills, poured from its polychromatic collection of thermoses.
Customers start arriving every day as early as 4am, filling the teahouse with lively notes of local dialect. For many of them, a morning cup of tea at Juhuayuan is an essential part of their daily routine.
Some regulars don’t come just for the tea, but for Pan Pingfu, owner of the teahouse who has been running the place for 50 years. Pan also works part-time as the barber, for the teahouse is really a money-losing business.
Pan, 75, is very committed to the teahouse, for the community and for the tradition it embodies.
Another well-kept tradition in Digang is fishing, which flourished during the Song Dynasty (960-1279).
In Digang, mulberry trees are planted along the edge of fishponds — an age-old form of man-made ecosystem, where both elements add more fertility to the other.
Mulberry leaves are harvested to feed silkworms for silk production, as well as to produce “fish mulberry tea” — a Digang specialty.
The abundance of fish, on the other hand, is clearly reflected in its local cuisine, which makes use of the versatile ingredient by steaming, frying, stewing and making meatballs.
A visit to the photovoltaic power plant in Hefu is rewarding. The plant’s 300,000 solar panels, arrayed like fish scales, belie a 400-acre fishing activity under the water — marrying the modern fishing industry with clean energy generation.
There are picturesque landscapes further down the city.
Covering an area of 6.3 square kilometers, Xishanyang (西山漾) National Wetland Park allows urban dwellers to make intimate contact with nature just 20 minutes away from the city center.
With its mix of sown fields, lakes, hills and gardens, Xishanyang is a charming combination of the natural and the artificial.
One-quarter green and three-quarters water, it is home to 386 species of plants, 29 bird species and 42 mammal species. Large fields of tulips, cole flowers, sunflowers, lotuses and reed flowers light up different parts of the park as seasons alternate.
With no highrise in the vicinity, the wetland affords a broad view that is especially stunning at sunrise and sunset on a clear day.
Visitors can either hang out in the park’s large lawn areas, or drive 8 kilometers by car to get a glimpse of all the vistas Xishanyang has to offer.
How to get there: It takes about two hours to travel from Shanghai to Huzhou by high-speed train, which is 160 kilometers. Another option is long-distance bus. Regular buses depart from Shanghai Long-distance Bus Station and Shanghai South Bus Station. The journey takes two to three hours.
By car, take G50 expressway and exit at Huzhou.
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