5-Day Huizhou Panorama: Villages, Huangshan Sunrise & the Stone Arches

Morning — Arrival in Huangshan
Fly into Huangshan Tunxi International Airport or arrive via high-speed train at Huangshan North Station, then transfer to Tangkou Town (about a one-hour drive), the gateway to the mountain. Your guide assists with hotel check-in and a brief orientation.

Afternoon — Hongcun Ancient Village
Visit Hongcun, a UNESCO-listed village of Ming–Qing architecture famed for its tranquil canals and the reflective Moon Pond. Its Hui-style houses and carved ancestral halls gained fame through the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Wander the cobblestone lanes to appreciate traditional design.

Evening — Hui Cuisine
In the evening, dine on Hui-style dishes such as stinky mandarin fish (fermented fish), hairy tofu, or bamboo shoots with ham, paired with local Huangshan Maofeng green tea.

Morning — Xidi, the village of the Hu clan
Xidi was built by and for one clan. The Hu family's men went out as Huizhou merchants from the Ming dynasty onwards, and the money came back as houses: white walls, grey tiles, horse-head gables, and interiors whose beams and door hoods carry Huizhou's three carvings in wood, brick and stone. You enter under the Memorial Archway of Hu Wenguang, a three-bay stone arch raised in 1578, and walk the lanes from there - Lufu Hall, hung with its old couplets; Dafu Di, with the small balcony built over the lane for a daughter of the house to watch the street; the small courtyards where the light comes in from above because the walls facing the lane are blind. UNESCO inscribed Xidi with Hongcun in 2000.

Lunch
A village restaurant outside the entrance, with Huizhou braised dishes and river fish.

Afternoon — Tunxi Old Street
Back in the city, the afternoon is for Tunxi Old Street: over a kilometre of Qing-dynasty shopfronts behind a continuous arcade, still selling the goods of the region - ink sticks, inkstones, tea, dried bamboo shoots, and the carved wood and stone that Huizhou is known for. Your guide will separate the old buildings from the rebuilt ones and, in the tea and ink shops, explain what you are looking at before you buy anything.

Evening — Free
Return to your hotel. The evening is at your leisure, with suggestions from your guide for dinner.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch

Accommodation
Overnight in Huangshan city (Tunxi); on a two-day programme the tour ends here.

Morning — Eastern Steps Hike
Take a shuttle to the Yungu Temple cable car and ascend to Begin-to-Believe Peak, the gateway to Huangshan's eastern ridges. Hike among twisted pines and granite summits above a sea of clouds, passing Lion Peak, Monkey Gazing at the Sea, and Dawn Pavilion. Your guide sets a pace suited to the group.

Lunch — Mountain-Top Meal
Enjoy a simple lunch at a summit restaurant; options are limited, so packing snacks is wise.

Afternoon — Western Sea Grand Canyon
Descend into the dramatic Western Sea Grand Canyon, a vast valley with cliffside trails and panoramic viewpoints. For a thrilling shortcut, ride the small Cloud Tram monorail or hike the steep “Fairy Walking Bridge” path.

Evening — Sunset at Bright Top
Check into a mountain-top hotel such as Beihai or Xihai, then catch the sunset from Bright Top Peak, Huangshan's second-highest point, with 360-degree vistas of mist-swirled peaks.

Before dawn — Sunrise
You leave the hotel while it is still dark, with a torch, and walk to one of the sunrise viewpoints on the summit ridge - Bright Summit or Clear Cool Terrace, depending on where the weather is coming from. Your guide will have checked the forecast the evening before and will tell you honestly whether sunrise is worth the alarm; when it works, the cloud below the ridge lights from underneath and the granite peaks stand out of it one after another. Expect to stand still in the cold for twenty minutes, and dress for it.

Breakfast
Back at the hotel for breakfast, or a packed breakfast if the group prefers to stay out.

Morning — The high ground
With the tour groups still on their way up, the morning belongs to anyone already on the mountain. You walk out to Paiyun Pavilion and the Flying-over Rock, a block of granite balanced on a narrower base that has been photographed from every angle for a century, and take the ridge paths with the cloud still in the valleys.

Lunch
A set meal at a restaurant on the mountain.

Afternoon — The Guest-Greeting Pine and down
The descent goes down past the Guest-Greeting Pine at Yuping, the pine growing out of the rock that has become the emblem of Huangshan, and then down the stairway or by the Yuping cable car to the lower station. The scenic shuttle returns you to the transfer terminal, where your driver is waiting.

Evening — Back in the city
Private vehicle to Huangshan city (Tunxi). On a two-day programme the tour ends here; on a longer programme you continue the next morning.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch

Accommodation
Not included - this day ends back in Huangshan city; on a longer programme it is an overnight in Huangshan city (Tunxi).

Morning — The seven arches of Tangyue
Seven stone memorial arches stand in a line along the approach to Tangyue, raised over the Ming and Qing dynasties by and for the Bao family. Each one is a public reward for a private virtue - loyalty to the throne, filial piety, chastity, charity - and read in order they are a short course in what the imperial state expected of a family and what a family could expect in return. Your guide takes them one by one: who was honoured, in which reign, and why the sequence was arranged the way it was. The village behind them still works its fields.

Late morning — Bao Family Garden
Beside the arches, Bao Family Garden was laid out on the site of the Bao family's own Qing-dynasty garden, and it is now best known for its collection of penjing - the Chinese art of miniature trees and rock, trained over decades and set out in long beds under the white walls of the garden. It is a quiet place to walk after the arches, and it shows what a Huizhou merchant family spent its money on besides houses.

Lunch
A local restaurant, with Huizhou braised pork, river fish and seasonal greens.

Afternoon — Onward travel
Your guide assists with check-out, and the private vehicle carries you to Huangshan North railway station or Tunxi Airport, with help through the ticket barrier or at check-in.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch

Accommodation
Not included - departure day.