Before spending the final part of my trip in Shanghai, I used the weekend for a side trip to two cities famous for a very different side of China: Hangzhou and Suzhou.
Hangzhou meant tea fields, West Lake and rain. Suzhou meant classical gardens, canals and evening performances. And somewhere in between, there was a missed train, an unexpected connection through Shanghai and another lesson in navigating China independently.
Hangzhou – Tea and rain
I took the high-speed train to Hangzhou, left my luggage at the railway station and set off with just what I needed for the day.
My first destination was the Longjing tea area, reached by a combination of metro and bus. Longjing—Dragon Well—is one of China's most famous green teas and has been produced in the hills around Hangzhou for centuries.
I visited the tea fields, Longjing Temple and the China National Tea Museum, where I learned considerably more about Chinese tea, its history, production and the role it plays in Chinese culture.
And naturally, after learning about tea, you have to drink some. I settled into the museum's tea house with a cup of tea, watching the rain outside while writing my travelogue.
As I could observe while sitting there for a while, every tea variety came with its own set of teapot, tea cup and information.
With the green surroundings and the rain coming down, this was one of those moments when not doing very much was exactly the right thing to do.
The rain, however, had apparently decided to accompany me for the rest of the day.
West Lake – A landscape designed over centuries
From the tea area, I continued to West Lake, Hangzhou's most famous attraction.
What looks like a beautiful natural lake is also the result of centuries of human intervention. Since at least the Tang and Song dynasties, the lake has been dredged, its banks reinforced, causeways constructed and temples, pagodas, gardens and pavilions carefully placed around it. The idea wasn't simply to preserve nature, but to create harmonious views in which water, hills, architecture and vegetation complement each other.
That approach to landscape design became enormously influential in China and later also inspired garden design elsewhere in East Asia. Today, the West Lake Cultural Landscape is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
I walked along the banks and part of the Su Causeway, enjoying the scenery despite the persistent light rain. The causeway itself dates back to the Northern Song dynasty and is traditionally associated with the poet and statesman Su Shi, who governed Hangzhou and oversaw dredging work on the lake.
Then I took a boat to Xiaoyingzhou, one of the islands in the lake.
It was beautiful, although crowded, with paths, bridges, pavilions and water creating constantly changing views. I also admired Three Pools Mirroring the Moon, with its three small stone pagodas rising from the water.
I couldn't board the first boat because priority was given to passengers with disabilities. The boat I did board then made an extra circle around the island before heading back to shore.
By this point, my train departure was getting uncomfortably close.
My DiDi was already nearby when I reached land—but on the wrong side of a divided road. There was no way to simply cross directly to it. And, of course, I still had to retrieve my luggage from the railway station.
The result was inevitable: I missed my direct train to Suzhou.
When connecting is faster than direct
As I described in my post about travelling across China by high-speed train, missing that train led to an interesting discovery. Hangzhou and Suzhou aren't particularly far apart, but the direct train I had booked took a surprisingly long route. When I started looking for alternatives, I found a better solution: Hangzhou → Shanghai → Suzhou. I booked two new trains, changed in Shanghai and continued to Suzhou.
Despite missing my original direct train and adding a connection, I arrived in Suzhou earlier than I would have on the train I'd missed. Sometimes direct really isn't better. My adventures weren't quite finished when I arrived. I initially got my guesthouse mixed up because the name shown on Booking.com wasn't identical to the one used on AMap. That's something worth remembering when booking smaller Chinese hotels and guesthouses.
My tip: contact the property through WeChat beforehand and ask them to send you an AMap location link. It can save a lot of confusion when you arrive.
Suzhou – The art of creating nature
The city became particularly important as a centre of garden culture during the Ming and Qing dynasties, when wealthy officials, scholars and merchants created private retreats within the city.
Space was often limited, so the challenge was to make a relatively small garden feel like an entire landscape.
The idea was not to reproduce nature exactly, but to create an idealised miniature version of it.
Several of Suzhou's surviving classical gardens are now UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
There's also a practical point before you set off: you need to book the gardens through a mini program on WeChat or Alipay.
It is worth sorting this out before arriving at the entrance rather than discovering it when you get there.
Nothing humble about the Humble Administrator's Garden
The next morning, I started with the Humble Administrator's Garden. Despite the name, there is very little humble about it.
Dating from the early 16th century, it is the largest of Suzhou's classical gardens. Ponds, lotus plants, pavilions, bridges, rocks and covered walkways create one carefully composed view after another. It is absolutely beautiful.
The downside? Everyone else knows that too.
It was very crowded, and practically every attractive corner had become a photo spot. Every pavilion, doorway and carefully framed view seemed to have someone posing in front of it.
There was an audio guide, which provided plenty of background information. But I discovered something about myself during this trip: sometimes there is simply too much going on around you to concentrate on an audio guide. Between navigating the crowds, looking at the garden and taking photos, I can't claim to remember very much of what it told me.
Later, I went to the Lingering Garden.
There was an audio guide here as well, but by then I had largely accepted my limitations as an attentive audio-guide listener.
It was afternoon and there were still plenty of visitors, but the experience felt different. I could actually find some quieter corners where I could stop, sit and simply enjoy the scenery.
Of the two, the Humble Administrator's Garden may be the more famous, but I appreciated having a little more space at the Lingering Garden.
Lingering spot in the garden
Suzhou from the water
After an early dinner, it was time to give Chinese city cruises another chance.
My experience with the city river cruise in Guilin hadn't exactly made me eager to repeat the concept. But my colleague Tao had recommended the Waicheng River cruise, so I decided to investigate.
This time, I asked the ticket vendor plenty of questions before handing over my money. And this time, it paid off.
I chose the long Waicheng River cruise, and it was much more enjoyable than the one in Guilin. There was some commentary in Chinese and a small performance, but mostly I could simply sit back and watch Suzhou pass by. It was relaxed, scenic and exactly what I wanted from an evening boat trip.
Suzhou's canals were historically essential to the city's transport, trade and daily life, and seeing the city from the water felt like an appropriate way to experience it.
From the morning crowds to Panmen almost alone
I got off the boat one stop before the end because my ticket also included admission to Panmen. The contrast to that morning couldn't have been greater.
After squeezing through crowds at the Humble Administrator's Garden, I found myself wandering around Panmen almost completely alone.
Panmen is part of Suzhou's ancient city fortifications and is unusual because it combines both a land gate and a water gate—a reminder of how closely the historic city was connected to its waterways. The scenic area also includes the beautiful Ruiguang Pagoda.
After the busy gardens, having this historic area almost to myself was wonderful.
Outside on the square, however, there was more life. Some people were flying long dragon-shaped kites, while a group of teenagers were practising a choreography to K-pop.
Ancient city walls, Chinese dragons and K-pop within a few metres of each other—it was a rather nice snapshot of modern China. But apparently two gardens in one day weren't enough.
Master of the Nets after dark
From Panmen, I took a DiDi to the Master of the Nets Garden for its evening programme. This was probably one of my favourite experiences in Suzhou.
The Master of the Nets Garden is much smaller than the Humble Administrator's Garden, but that is part of its appeal. It is particularly famous for how effectively it uses limited space, with architecture, water, rocks and carefully framed views making the garden appear larger and more varied than it actually is.
The evening visit wasn't simply a walk around the garden. A guide led us from one location to another, where a series of traditional cultural performances took place within different rooms, courtyards and pavilions.
The tour itself was in Chinese, but there were written explanations in English at the different stops. Ironically, that meant I understood more about what I was seeing than at several other attractions where I'd listened to long explanations entirely in Chinese.
Moving through the illuminated garden from performance to performance was a lovely way to finish the day.
Before leaving, I stopped at the tea house for tea and a mooncake to take with me for the journey back to Shanghai.
Then it was time for another train.
Hangzhou or Suzhou?
Hangzhou was about a larger landscape: tea fields, hills, West Lake and centuries of shaping nature on a grand scale. The light rain that followed me all day somehow suited it perfectly—even if the combination of boats, roads and luggage eventually cost me my train.
Suzhou took the same Chinese fascination with creating harmonious landscapes and compressed it into private urban gardens.
And despite visiting some of the most famous sights in both cities, my favourite moments were often the quieter ones: drinking tea while watching the rain in Hangzhou, finding a calm corner in the Lingering Garden, wandering almost alone through Panmen and moving from performance to performance through the Master of the Nets Garden after dark.
Then, after a weekend of tea, gardens, rain, boats—and one missed train—I continued to Shanghai for the final part of my China trip.
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