When people ask for somewhere off the usual China trail, I send them to Taizhou (台州) in coastal Zhejiang. It’s a place foreign tourists almost never reach, yet it stacks up ancient walls, a sacred mountain, jaw-dropping cliffs and some of the best seafood I’ve eaten — all within easy reach by high-speed rail.

Quick clarification: This is Taizhou in Zhejiang (台州), on the coast south of Ningbo — not Taizhou in Jiangsu (泰州). They share the same pinyin but are different cities. Make sure your ticket says Zhejiang.

Why I love it

It has the scenery and history of China’s famous spots, but with locals living their daily lives instead of tour buses. You feel like you’ve found something.

What to see

• Linhai Ancient City Wall (临海台州府城墙) — a Tang-and-Ming city wall snaking over green hills, often called the “Great Wall of the South” (江南长城). It’s said the northern Great Wall’s design was partly influenced by it. Walking it at sunset, with the old town of Linhai below, is the highlight of the region.
• Ziyang Old Street (紫阳古街) — at the foot of the wall, Linhai’s thousand-year-old main street: grey-tiled shopfronts, snack stalls, traditional bakeries and tea houses. Come hungry and wander.
• Tiantai Mountain (天台山) — a major sacred mountain for both Buddhism and Taoism. Guoqing Temple (国清寺), founded in the 6th century, is the cradle of the Tiantai school of Buddhism and was hugely influential in Japan and Korea. Quiet, ancient, and free of crowds.
• Shenxianju (神仙居), “the Dwelling of Immortals” — a stunning landscape of sheer cliffs, peaks and waterfalls, threaded with cable cars and vertigo-inducing glass plank walkways clinging to the rock face.
• The coast and islands — Taizhou faces the East China Sea, with fishing harbours and offshore islands. Which brings me to the food.

Eat the seafood

Taizhou cuisine is built around the day’s catch — steamed fish, razor clams, mud crab, sweet local shrimp, all cooked simply to taste of the sea. If you’ve only had inland Chinese food, this is a revelation.

Here’s the part most travellers don’t realise: Xin Rong Ji (新荣记) — today one of China’s most celebrated fine-dining names — started right here in Taizhou, and its original flagship is still in the city.

🌟 Why it matters: Xin Rong Ji is China’s most decorated restaurant group. Its outposts hold Michelin stars in Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong and even Tokyo — the Hong Kong branch reached the coveted three Michelin stars — and several rank on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants. The whole empire is essentially refined Taizhou home cooking.

Eating it at the source, where the seafood comes straight off the local boats, is the real thing rather than the big-city version — and far easier to book than the famous branches. If you can get a table at the Taizhou restaurant, do; it’s the single best argument for the whole trip.

How to reach it

Take the high-speed rail to Taizhou Station — roughly 2.5–3 hours from Shanghai or about 1.5 hours from Hangzhou (see my high-speed rail guide). From the station, the sights are spread out, so a couple of Didi rides or a hired driver for the day make life easy. Give it two or three days to do it justice.