5 Days in Yueyang

One of the three great towers of the Jiangnan, rebuilt in 1880 as a pure-wood helmet-roofed structure about 19.4 m tall — the tower Fan Zhongyan invoked without visiting in his 1046 essay. Walk the lakeshore below, then eat along the Bianhe street.

1. yueyang tower
2. yueyang dongting lake
3. yueyang bianhe street

Out to Junshan, an island of just 0.96 km2 in Dongting Lake — some 2,600 km2, the second-largest freshwater lake in China — with the two-consorts tomb, the speckled bamboo and the yellow-tea tastings of Junshan Yinzhen.

1. yueyang junshan island

Fifteen to twenty minutes north by HSR to Miluo, where the poet Qu Yuan drowned himself in 278 BC and where dragon-boat racing for the Duanwu festival took root — the festival entered UNESCO's intangible list in 2009. The riverside park gathers the ancestral hall and the exhibition halls.

1. yueyang quzi cultural park

An hour east of town, the Zhang clan has held this valley village for over 600 years since the Ming founder arrived — courtyards linked under one roofline, with Ming-Qing dwellings reported near 54,000 m2. Wear shoes that can take stone lanes.

1. yueyang zhangguying village

The Cishi pagoda by the lake is counted among Hunan's earliest brick pagodas, the Confucian temple keeps its Song-era hall, and the city museum lays out the region's bronze and porcelain finds. A market lunch, then the HSR — Changsha is about half an hour away.

1. yueyang cishi pagoda
2. yueyang confucian temple
3. yueyang city museum
4. yueyang city markets