7 Days in Yiyang

Some 70 km from Changsha, the city keeps three stone-paved port lanes from the Ming and Qing — Yulingpo, Denglong and the Wei-family lane. Walk them at leisure, then follow the Zi River promenade after dark.

1. yiyang ming qing ancient lanes
2. yiyang zi river waterfront

Huilongshan rises just south of the river, its Xixia temple said to date back to the Eastern Jin; stairs and pavilions make an easy morning. The city museum nearby traces the Zi River basin from prehistory to the tea trade.

1. yiyang huilongshan
2. yiyang city museum

An hour west, groves roll over the Taojiang hills — the county counts roughly a million mu of bamboo, around 670 km2 — and the 1930s song about the Peach Blossom River still plays in the town below.

1. yiyang taohuajiang bamboo sea
2. yiyang city markets

Two hours northwest to Dongping, where the China Dark Tea Museum opened in 2015 beside the old wharf streets; exhibits cover the 1595 government-tea edict and the 36.25 kg thousand-tael logs.

1. yiyang dark tea museum
2. yiyang city markets

The old tea route south of town runs past Dongshi old street to the Qing-dynasty Yongxi covered bridge, a timber span rebuilt many times by village subscription. Overnight again in Anhua.

1. yiyang anhua tea horse road
2. yiyang yongxi bridge

East to Yuanjiang, where the South Dongting reserve spans some 1,680 km2 of lake, marsh and islets — the greater part of the 2,600 km2 Dongting — and hosts tens of thousands of wintering waterfowl; Yanzhi Lake nearby makes a quiet afternoon loop. Return to Yiyang for the night.

1. yiyang south dongting wetland
2. yiyang yanzhi lake

Qingxi Village preserves the former residence of novelist Zhou Libo (1908-1979), whose 1958 novel Great Changes in a Mountain Village is set here. A market lunch, then the HSR — Changsha is about half an hour on the line completed in December 2022.

1. yiyang qingxi village
2. yiyang city markets