7-Day Guqin & Scholars' Gathering Culture Tour

Morning — West Lake by Bicycle
Take the high-speed rail from Shanghai to Hangzhou (about 1.5 hours) and rent a bicycle at West Lake to ride leisurely around its shores. Pass famed spots such as Broken Bridge, Bai Causeway, Solitary Hill, and Su Causeway, enjoying lake-and-mountain scenery and the legends behind each site. West Lake, a UNESCO World Heritage site since 2011, is the heart of Hangzhou's beauty.

Afternoon — Lingyin Temple
Visit Lingyin Temple (Temple of the Soul's Retreat), one of China's most famous Buddhist monasteries, founded in 326 AD. Admire ancient Buddha statues, towering trees, and exquisite murals; burn incense and pray if you wish, and feel the profound Buddhist atmosphere. Stroll the surrounding scenic area's tranquil natural setting.

Evening — Music Fountain & Lakeside Dinner
Head to the West Lake Music Fountain Square for the evening fountain show, where water dances to music under colored lights. Afterward, dine near the lake on Hangzhou dishes such as beggar's chicken (baked in lotus leaves and mud) and Longjing shrimp (fresh shrimp stir-fried with tea leaves).

Morning — seven strings
The guqin is the oldest continuously played instrument in China: a narrow, unfretted zither of seven silk strings over a lacquered board, with more than three thousand pieces surviving in a tablature notation that records fingerings rather than pitch. It was the instrument of the scholar rather than the court musician, played alone or for one listener, and its volume is so low that it was never intended for a hall. The class is held in a garden residence on the West Lake side, in a room with the doors open to the courtyard. You begin with the seated position, the right-hand plucks and the left-hand slide that produces the instrument's characteristic sustained, fading note, and the teacher's first correction is almost always about relaxing the shoulder.

Late morning — the repertoire
The second session is listening and history. Pieces such as Flowing Water and Guangling San have lineages that run back centuries, and the tablature has been reconstructed piece by piece by modern players working from Ming and Qing printed collections. The guqin was proclaimed by UNESCO as intangible heritage in 2003 and added to the representative list in 2006, and its revival in the last two decades has been driven less by conservatories than by amateur players who meet in small groups. Participants learn the opening phrases of one short piece by tablature, reading the characters as fingerings.

Lunch
Lunch in a garden restaurant beside the water, with local dishes that are deliberately light: the meal before a tea gathering should not be heavy.

Afternoon — the four arts of the studio
The afternoon covers the context the guqin belonged to. The literati studio was furnished with qin, qi - the board game, usually translated as go - shu, meaning calligraphy, and hua, painting, and the four were practised by the same person in the same room rather than by specialists. Participants try ink and brush in a calligraphy session, with the same teacher's emphasis on posture, and then learn how a tea gathering is actually conducted: who sits where, how water temperature is judged, why the first infusion of a Longjing is poured away and the second is served. It is a slow afternoon and is meant to be.

Evening — tea gathering and recital
The day closes with a tea gathering in the garden, at which the teacher plays two short pieces on the guqin and one participant, if they wish, plays what they learned in the morning. There is no audience beyond the group. This is the correct setting for the instrument, and for most participants it is the quietest hour of the programme.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
In Hangzhou.

Morning — West Lake Cruise
Begin with a boat cruise on West Lake, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and Hangzhou's crown jewel. Glide past Leifeng Pagoda and the tree-lined Su Causeway, framed by willows and lotus, while your guide shares the legend of the White Snake. The lake has inspired Chinese poets and painters for a millennium.

Afternoon — Lingyin Temple
Visit Lingyin Temple (“Temple of the Soul's Retreat”), one of China's oldest Buddhist monasteries, founded in the 4th century at the foot of Feilai Peak. Marvel at its grand halls and the 1,700-year-old laughing Buddha, then explore the Feilai Feng Grottoes with their intricate rock-carved Buddhist sculptures.

Evening — West Lake Music Fountain
End the day at the West Lake Music Fountain near Hubin Park, a free choreographed display of water, light, and music. Arrive early for a front-row view of this blend of tradition and modernity.

Morning — High-Speed Rail to Suzhou & Smart Manufacturing
Transfer from Hangzhou to Suzhou by high-speed rail, then visit smart-manufacturing companies in the Suzhou Industrial Park — a flagship China-Singapore cooperation zone established in 1994. Explore AI applications in industrial scenarios such as smart factories and intelligent production lines.

Afternoon — Return to Shanghai
Return to Shanghai by high-speed rail, arriving at your hotel to rest after the day's travel between cities.

Evening — At Your Leisure
The evening is yours to enjoy at your leisure in Shanghai.

Morning — the Yushan school
Suzhou is not incidental in the history of the guqin. The Yushan school was founded here in the late Ming by Yan Tianchi, and it argued for a clear, unforced tone and for playing from the tablature as written rather than from an over-decorated oral tradition - a reform that shaped how the instrument is taught to this day. The studio where the class is held is a quiet room with a small collection of instruments, each one a lacquered board of paulownia or fir with seven silk or nylon-steel strings and thirteen inlaid studs marking the harmonic positions. You begin by tuning, which is done by ear and takes as long as it takes.

Late morning — right hand, then left
Technique is taught in a fixed order. The right hand learns the plucked strokes - the outward and inward strokes, the two-string chords, and the light repeated stroke that gives a long note its life. The left hand then learns to stop the string, slide along it and produce harmonics at the studs. The instrument's volume is deliberately small: a guqin cannot fill a room, which is why it was played for one listener and why it survived as a private art. Participants learn a short piece phrase by phrase from tablature and play it back, badly and then less badly.

Lunch
Lunch in the old city, kept light and taken slowly; the afternoon is a garden, and a garden is not improved by a heavy meal.

Afternoon — a classical garden
In the afternoon the group visits one of the classical gardens for which Suzhou is inscribed by UNESCO - the Humble Administrator's Garden, the Lingering Garden or the Master of the Nets Garden, depending on the day and the season, since crowd management is part of the visit. Your guide reads the garden the way it was designed to be read: the framed view at the entrance that hides the whole and shows a fragment, the borrowed scenery of a pagoda outside the wall, the corridors that turn so that the visitor's sightline changes every few steps, and the named pavilions at the points where the designer wanted you to stop.

Evening — a tea gathering with music
The day closes with a tea gathering in a garden setting or a tea room overlooking one, conducted properly - seated, with water brought to the right temperature, the first pour discarded and the second served. The teacher plays two short guqin pieces and explains what to listen for in the decay of each note. Participants who learned the morning's phrase may play it. There is no other audience, and the evening ends early.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
In Suzhou.

Morning — Humble Administrator's Garden
Suzhou's largest and most celebrated classical garden, a UNESCO World Heritage Site built in the Ming dynasty. Its pavilions, lotus ponds, and zigzag bridges embody scholarly landscape design, including the “borrowed scenery” technique that frames distant pagodas. The Hall of Distant Fragrance is a central highlight.

Afternoon — Suzhou Museum & Pingjiang Road
The Suzhou Museum, designed by architect I. M. Pei, pairs a minimalist water-themed structure with ancient Chinese art and artifacts. Then stroll Pingjiang Road, a 1,200-year-old canal-side lane of whitewashed houses, silk shops, and teahouses, where you can sip Biluochun tea and try squirrel-shaped mandarin fish.

Evening — Flexible Evening
The evening is yours to enjoy at your leisure in Suzhou.

Morning — Departure Transfer
Your guide and driver will pick you up from your hotel and transfer you to Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG) for your departure flight home, bringing your journey to a close.