Why go
The restored heart of Fuzhou is the 'Three Lanes, Seven Alleys' grid, where whitewashed mansions of imperial exam graduates now hold teahouses, bookshops and museums. It is commercial, but the architecture is genuine and dense enough to get lost in.
Fuzhou sits on a geothermal field — hotel bathhouses pipe natural hot spring water — and locals treat a soak as routine. For a leg-stretch, Gushan's forested trail climbs past 500 years of carved cliff calligraphy to a monastery above the Min River.
- Three Lanes and Seven Alleys — 'the living fossil of Ming-Qing street grids'
- Gushan (Drum Mountain) and its cliff-inscription trail
- Buddha Jumps Over the Wall in its home city
- Day trips to Quanzhou and the Fujian tulou
Where to go
Spend the morning in the lanes, soak in a hot-spring bathhouse in the afternoon, and climb Gushan early the next day before training onward to Quanzhou, the tulou or Wuyi Mountain.
What to eat
Buddha Jumps Over the Wall (fo tiao qiang) originated here — a slow-braised clay pot of abalone, sea cucumber, mushroom and ham. Also: fish balls, pork-and-taro buns and 'lychee pork' (crispy pork in sweet-sour sauce).
Getting there
- HSR from Xiamen ~1h50, Shanghai ~4h30
- Role
- Capital of Fujian province
- Hot springs
- City centre sits on a geothermal field
- Banyans
- Planted en masse since Song times
