Hangzhou Overview

Hangzhou, the city located at China's southeast coast, is the capital of Zhejiang Province and also the center of provincial politics, economy and culture. Besides, it's an important traffic hub in Southeast of China as well as the second center city of Yangtze River Delta Region. With its developed economy, Hangzhou has ranked the second in China according to its GDP and one of the nationwide ten top large and medium cities by its aggregate economic strength.

With a long history of over 2200 years, Hangzhou is one of the seven ancient cities in China. It is abundant in culture scenes: ancient yards, parks, architectures, pavilions, temples, fountains, grottos, plaques and so on. Visitors will be impressed by its bead curtains and jaspers, different bridges and misty galleries, clear water and delightful climate, unique stones and spectacular caves.  All such beautiful and attractive scenes have long led Hangzhou to be a very famous tourism city both in China and abroad. As early as the Song Dynasty, great literati Su Dongpo reputed Hangzhou in such saying "With its famous sceneries, Hangzhou is the best place for visiting in the world". And here's a widely expressed Chinese proverb "in heaven there is paradise and on earth there are Hangzhou and Suzhou". What's more, Marco Polo also described this city as "the most beautiful and magnificent city in the world".

West Lake
West Lake, the fascinating fairyland, used to be described as a charming Oriental beauty by Sudongpo. For the existence of West Lake, Hangzhou leaps to be one of most beautiful and luxurious cities in China.

Wuzhen
As one of four famous ancient towns in Jiangnan ,Wuzhen is a typical Jiangnan town, with a reputation of "hometown of fertile fish and rice, mansion of silk". The special character of Wuzhen is that it wholly shows the Jiangnan Building style: streets are built on river, buildings face river, streets are linked with bridges, and town and water are combined into a body.  

Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal
Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is the earliest, longest and largest project in the world’s canal history. Covering a total of 1,794 kilometers, the Grand Canal communicates Haihe River, Yellow River, Huaihe River, Yangtze River, and Qiantang River. The opening of the Grand Canal shapes a colorful Grand Canal Culture and attracts millions of visitors from the whole China and even all over the world.

Lingyin Temple
Surrounded with many old trees, groves of bamboo, and quiet and beautiful environment, www.alipfrance.com/.../atelier%20in%20the%20news%20070620%20journal%20EFL.pdfLingyin Temple is the earliest temple in Hangzhou, also the largest of several Buddhist temples in the Wulin Mountain Range., and one of the most beautiful and significant Buddhist monasteries in China.