Fujian Travel Guide
From Wikitravel
Fujian (福建) is a province in South East China.
Contents |
Cities
The three major cities (North to South along the coast) are:
Smaller cities include:
- Longyan — in the West of Fujian, nature reserves and Hakka earth houses
- Nanping — up the river from Fuzhou
- Ningde — on the coast, North of Fuzhou
- Putian — between Fuzhou and Quanzhou
- Sanming — up in the mountains
- Zhangzhou — inland of Xiamen
Other destinations
- Wu Yi Mountain, scenic area
Understand
Historically, Fujian has been one of the more prosperous and outward-looking provinces of China. In the 1900s, two of China's five treaty ports -- Xiamen and Fuzhou -- were in Fujian. After the Second World war, however, Fujian's traditional trade with Japan was reduced and her other main customer, Taiwan, was the enemy. Recently, however, Fujian is recovering. Like other coastal provinces, it is now one of the more modern and prosperous areas of China.
A long-term foreign resident has written three good in-depth guidebooks, one each for Fujian, Xiamen and Quanzhou. See the books' web site.
Talk
Today, all educated people in Fujian speak Mandarin. It has been the language of education throughout China since the 1950s and is now the lingua france in Fujian as everywhere else.
However, Fujian also has dozens of its own dialects. The terrain is mountainous; at one time nearly every valley had its own language. These dialects are usually described as Min-whatever, where Min is another name for Fujian.
Among the most important is Min nan hua, Southern Min, spoken in Xiamen, Quanzhou and surrounding areas. Many people in Taiwan speak the same language, though they may call it Taiwanese. In Singapore, the same language is caled Hokkien (the minnan word for Fujian).
Fuzhou hua also has a large number of speakers.
Get in
Fujian is well connected via China's domestic airline, bus, highway and train networks. The main airports are at Xiamen and Fuzhou; both have flights to Hong Kong as well as many mainland cities. Xiamen also has cheap international connections to Manila, Singapore and Bangkok; see Discount airlines in Asia for details.
The scenic Wu Yi Mountain area also has an airport with good domestic connections. Often package deals are available — flights accomodation and perhaps guide for a fixed price.
Get around
The main mode of intercity travel is by bus. Fujian is mountainous, so train routes are somewhat limited. Flying within the province is relatively expensive.
See
The province's main tourist attractions are Wu Yi Mountain and Xiamen's Gulang Yu. Quanzhou is off the beaten path but worth visiting.
Do
Eat
Fujian has its own cuisine, largely based on seafood. One famous dish is "Buddha jumps over a wall", a complex chowder that supposedly smells good enough to make a vegetarian monk forget his vows and hop a fence.
Drink
Like most of China, Fujian has quite a few locations for several large coffee chains, including UBC Coffee (Senda Kafei in Chinese), Ming Tien and SPR. It also has two very good cheaper smaller chains, Benz and King Buck.
Stay safe
Fujian, like other Southern coastal provinces, gets typhoons from time to time, mainly from July to September.
Get out
Neighboring provinces along the coast are Zhejiang to the North and Guangdong to the South. Jiangxi lies inland of Fujian. There are good connections to any of these by road or rail.
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