Huangshan

A pine out of the rock beside Yuping Tower, one branch held out like a greeting hand: the emblem of Huangshan. Since 1981 a keeper has been posted to this one tree, staying by it in rough weather. A short stair climbs to it from the Yuping cable car.

Stone steps pinned to the cliff drop to the canyon floor, the steepest stretch on the mountain. The full loop takes half a day; a rail car hauls you back up from the bottom to spare the legs. In mist the stair seems to fall away into nothing.

A broad top at 1,860 metres with a weather station on it. For the sunrise you stay overnight in a summit hotel and head out before dawn. The hotels lend thick coats, and the wind at that hour is sharp enough to need one in summer as well.

Settled under the Southern Song, given its ox-shaped water channels in the Ming, now World Heritage. The half-moon Yuezhao Pond and South Lake appear in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Art students with easels are always set up round the lake's stone bridge.

A Hu clan village listed as World Heritage together with Hongcun, a stone memorial arch of 1578 at its entrance. Its carved timber and beam ornament are reckoned richer than Hongcun's. The two lie close together and fit into one day.

Shops have traded on this street since the Song, two-storey timber fronts on both sides. Many sell Hui inksticks and She inkstones, and some will show you how ink is ground. After sunset the lanterns come on and snack stalls fill the street to its far end.

Seven stone arches raised by the Bao clan for filial sons and virtuous women, in single file along a field path. Four are Ming and three Qing, so the carving of two eras can be compared in turn. Even the village shrines come in pairs, one for each sex.

The walled town of Shexian, once seat of Huizhou prefecture. In the middle of its main street stands the Xu Guo arch of 1584; it has eight legs, so it faces you from every side. From the walls the view towards the Xin'an River is best around sunset.

Red sandstone cliffs set with Taoist temples and carved inscriptions, ranked among China's four sacred Taoist mountains. The colour is nothing like Huangshan's granite, another landscape in the same district. Close by, west of Tunxi, with few visitors.

Boats leave Shendu pier in Shexian and run downriver past loquat and tangerine orchards and old villages on both banks. They put in at a few of the riverside villages for a walk ashore. In May, when the loquats ripen, you buy them on board.

The name means believe it once you see it, and twisted pines hang off every ledge. It sits near the top station of the Yungu cable car, an easy first stop on the summit. The narrow tip passes single file, so in peak season the wait is long.

A small village stacked up a slope north of Hongcun, known for autumn colour. Its tallow trees go red and gold from the last days of October to early November. Then photographers set tripods on the opposite hill before dawn, waiting for mist.

An old Huizhou village whose streams and lanes are said to follow the bagua of feng shui. The Ming ancestral hall of Luo Dongshu, with finely carved pillars and beams, is the centrepiece. Fewer tour groups than Hongcun leaves the lanes walkable.

A village a stroll from Hongcun, worth it for the carvings in Zhicheng Hall, a Qing merchant's house. Every lattice and door panel is cut with layered figures and flowers. It is dim inside; a phone light picks out the detail.

An old village in Yi County where Zhang Yimou shot the film Ju Dou. Narrow lanes tangle between high white walls like a maze, and first-timers get lost easily. The house that played the film's dye workshop still stands.

Over the border in Jiangxi, south of Huangshan, an easy day out by high-speed rail. From mid-March to early April rapeseed blooms on terraced fields, with white-walled, black-tiled Huizhou houses set among them. Weekend roads to the lookouts jam then.