Grand Canal

During my visit in early 2014, I was not aware of the Grand Canal nomination despite it gaining inscription later that year. But visiting Suzhou and going out of the railway station already allows a fair glimpse into this massive engineering marvel deserving of many superlatives. The canal stretch fronting the railway station is already quite visually pleasing as it is backdropped by massive Pingmen Gate and a nearby smaller water gate; this section of old city wall was rebuilt in 2012. The old city's Ring Canal is part of the Suzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal, and true to its function it is still being used by far-reaching cargo boats and barges that are vital for commerce and transportation as well as by tourist boats that can go to the more popular scenic areas. 

The surroundings of the Humble Administrator's Garden and the Lion's Grove Garden coincide with the Pingjiang Conservation Area, whose 800-year old canal complex is identified as a part of the Jiangnan Canal. This, therefore, makes Suzhou a good site to see inscribed parts of the Grand Canal that can support larger vessels, as well as a network of interior waterways navigable only by smaller hand-paddled boats. 

Although the 2,500-year old historic block of Pingjiang does not seem to be as popular as the Shantang River Conservation Area and Fengqiao Scenic Spot for "idyllic lantern-dotted views" of the Grand Canal, it also has canal boat tours, ancient bridges, traditional Suzhou-style houses (100+ …

I visited in June 2024 the section of the Grand Canal that is located in central Beijing. The inscribed part there consists mostly of Houhai, Qianhai and Xihai lakes, collectively known as Shichachai lake. These lakes are very lovely place to walk around with many trees providing shade from summer sunshine. The famous Beijing hutongs surround them with plenty of shops and restaurants to look for souvenirs or taste Chinese treats. Paddle boats seemed to be a popular activity with locals along with shopping, of course.

For Grand Canal purposes the most interesting site along the lakes is Wanning Bridge (pictured). The bridge is the oldest bridge in Beijing's central axis, originally dating from 1285, but obviously renovated multiple times since then. The bridge is still in active use with busy road going over it. Next to the bridge is 2 statues of water-harnessing beasts, probably dragons. The canal is a very pretty sight, with trees lining the canal and the water is crystal clear. You can see fish swimming in the canal and bright green plants growing at the bottom of the canal. Everything is very clean and recently renovated. The information signs next to the bridge were more concentrated on its relation to the central axis than the Grand Canal. Next to the bridge you can see also remains of a watergate besides the beast statues.

Other picturesque spot along the lakes is the small bridge between Qianhai and Houhai lakes. Very short walk away from …

I may have seen glimpses of the Grand Canal before in Beijing, Suzhou and Hangzhou, but I had never visited it consciously and thus hadn’t counted it so far. Remarkably, the Chinese have pulled off an inscription in one go (a “perfect inscription”) for such a vast serial site.

In this review, I will focus on the Hangzhou sites of interest within the Jiaxing-Hangzhou section. Most of those lie some 5km north of that other Hangzhou WHS, West Lake. Only the Fengshan Water Gate, which I did not visit, is close to the city center. The main remains lie close to Gongchen Bridge. You can reach it via the blue metro line and get off at the station aptly named ‘Grand Canal’. Hangzhou’s metro network was extended significantly in 2022 but this is not shown often in English language online resources.

Things to see in this area:

• Qiaoxi Conservation Area: this was the former merchant district, which has retained (or was it rebuilt?) its traditional streets, lanes and wooden buildings. It looks quite pretty but it is also very touristy, with ‘attractions’ such as an umbrella museum.
• Gongchen Bridge (pictured): this is a fine stone arch bridge over the Grand Canal, and the most historic bridge still standing in this section.
• Grand Canal Museum: a large hall at the ‘other’ end of the Gongchen Bridge. It does tell about what the Grand Canal meant for Hangzhou: it caused it to grow into a prosperous, …

WHS#73

Canals are a rather frequent, maybe a tad overrepresented, subject for WHS. After all, don't they all somewhat follow the same concept? Sure, maybe one is older, another makes use of interesting locks, and so on. Sure, very few canals (on their own, not as urban landscapes or aqueducts) actually end up on the list, but maybe it's the wrong selection. It's just strange that the 2 most important canals in the world, the Panama and Suez, don't feature on the list or even on the T-list. One canal that has gotten it's rightful recognition, though, is the Grand Canal of China. This is the grandfather of regional canal systems in the world, not just in age, but in the size of its network too. This literally connected the ends of one of the greatest oldest civilizations in the world, and it's remarkable to have survived to this day, intact across the region.

When I visited Suzhou in rainy June 2019, I made sure to check out the most famous street in the city, Shantang Street. It's just a short subway ride from the main train station, and it's really close to the Lingering Garden, one of the Classical Gardens of Suzhou. Shantang is a really atmospheric commercial area, mostly because of 2 things: its centuries-old buildings and the Grand Canal. Yes, canals form the heart of Suzhou as they were the centers of trade back in the day, and that means that they are often surrounded …

In June 2017 I made a day trip by train from Shanghai Hongqiao Railway Station to Suzhou Railway Station and then took Suzhou Rail Transit to Binhe Lu Station since it was the nearest station to the Suzhou Fengqiao Scenery Spot, one of the more scenic and easily-reachable parts of the Grand Canal of China UNESCO World Heritage SIte. From the Suzhou Fengqiao Scenery Spot, it was a 30-minute walk along a canal to the Lingering Garden, one of the Classical Gardens of Suzhou. But the best site was the plate of xiaolongxia (spicy crayfish), only available during the summer season and perhaps the most flavorful dish I've ever eaten.

Site visited April 2017. I visited four inscribed sites of this WHS, three granaries and one proper stretch of the actual canal.

At first, when I planned my trip to China, this site looked like just a tedious tick off. But when I searched more information about it, this site became very exciting. I found many interesting Grand Canal sites which would be very nice to visit. The only limitation would be time - which places would be within reach for my itinerary. I used Luoyang as one of my bases for my day trips so there were two options for canal visits: either Zhengzhou Section of Tongji Canal or Hua County and Xun County Section of Wei Canal (Yongji Canal). The former is nearer but it would be a bit problematic to get to because there are not any clear landmarks where to take a taxi without any Chinese skills. The latter is conveniently located along the high speed railway line towards Anyang so I would be able to visit it on my way to Yin Xu site. Additionally, I would be able to tick off one more granary site. So I chose that one.

One might wonder why there are many granaries (storehouses of grain) in this kind of watery World Heritage Site. It is justified to the background that the canal is originally created for transportation of grain. The Grand Canal answered to the massive needs of agricultural empire. It solved many unbalances in society and …

China is a “different country” every few years – even back in 1989 it was already very different from my previous visit in 1978 but some aspects had not yet changed – in particular the road system was still very poor. We had seen the hints of things to come in the form of motorway construction but, for anyone wanting to get from Suzhou to Hangzhou the 12 hour overnight boat journey along the Grand Canal was still a reasonable way to go. Today (2014) the motorway journey takes around 2 hours to cover the c 170kms and only tourists would want to take the canal route – which does indeed still seem to be available!

We had already seen the teeming life of the canal during our cycle tours around Suzhou and it was great to get in amongst it all on a boat. This was packed with passengers and we had to grab a couple of bunks from the hundreds on a lower deck. The overnight schedule meant that a lot of the trip was in the dark but I remember well the evening and morning views. My attached photo, scanned from a diapositive, captures well the almost continuous “traffic jam” of cargo boats, often in the form of great “snakes” of barges loaded to the gunwales with bricks, gravel, coal etc and sacks of unknown contents! It appears that China’s investment in road and rail across the intervening years has in no way reduced the use …

Nowhere in China can show the importance of influence in socioeconomics and culture of the ancient engineering marvel of the Grand Canal than the prosperous Jiangnan Region. During my Jiangnan visit in 2011, I crisscrossed the Grand Canal and its branches many times; I saw many beautiful water towns such as Wuzhen and Zhouzhuang, however for the best part of the Grand Canal itself was in Suzhou and Yangzhou areas, the two cities that embraced the canal and became trading hub as well as cultural center. While the highlight of Suzhou is the famous classical gardens, the city old town of Pingjiang District is equally interesting with beautiful Jiangnan vernacular houses, the style that quite similar with the Huizhou style of World Heritage Site of Xidi and Hongcun villages, small canals, stone ached bridges, and rows of weeping willow tree, a very classic image of charming Chinese water towns. Pingjiang is also the last vestiges of old Suzhou that still perfectly preserves its old area with few modern revival old, styled buildings, so to be listed as World Heritage Site, for me is the good act and final completion to preserve Suzhou as one of the most beautiful cities in China. Pan Men Gate is another nominated scenic area in southwest corner of old Suzhou, the main attraction here is the fine old city gate and beautiful Ruiguang Pagoda in the nice landscape garden. However, to be honest there was nothing much to see and I spent the majority of …

It looks like this site may be China's proposal in 2014. As such I decided I could attempt to get in a pre-emptive strike at what I hope may be part of the inscription. I visited the new Grand Canal park in the town of Tongzhou which is essentially a suburb of Beijing. It is here that the massive Grand Canal had its northern terminus, before goods were offloaded to be taken into Beijing proper. It seems a lot of money has been spent on making the park into a nice recreation area, and some of the local bridges are also being restored. The park has some nice touches, especially a sculpture on the ground that recreates the course of the canal and shows scenes from its illustrious history. However whilst I was there is just felt pretty windblown and desolate, the only people there were a group of school children, an elderly man flying a kite and one western tourist trying hard to fight off jet lag.

It was nice to be there though and it was interesting in an everyday off the beaten track kind of way. I can't say I have seen the best of this massive feat of engineering, but the girth of the canal was impressive. My hopes of getting onto the water were scuppered, there were no pleasure boats sailing (despite internet sources suggesting there were), the floating restaurant was closed and looking derelict and it was too windy for me even to venture …

I love this ancient wonder still in use. the most impressive one is in Hangzhou, the southern point of the canal~ river cruise, historic buildings, local restaurants and tea houses, museums along the canal (they are best museums in China, not large in size, but focus on local topics, like pottery, sword, scissor, and of course, canal), art galleries, as well as the night sightseeing. It's just awesome!!