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South China · 华南Capital: Guangzhou

Guangdong广东·粤 / 岭南

Cantonese culture, dim sum, and China's most international southern coast.

Guangdong is the for many travelers from Hong Kong, Macau and Southeast Asia. The strings together Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan and Zhuhai into one of the world's densest urban regions.

Expect , year-round greenery, and serious — morning yum cha, slow-cooked soups, and seafood night markets are everyday rituals here.

Guangdong is also the source of much of the — generations of migrants from Toishan, Kaiping and Zhongshan built the Chinatowns of San Francisco, Vancouver, Sydney and Bangkok.

Top Attractions

Culture & Traditions

Cantonese Yum Cha Ritual

"Drink tea, eat dim sum" is the Pearl River Delta's universal social glue. Knuckle-tap the table to thank the pourer; you'll do it instinctively after three meals.

Lion Dance & Wing Chun

Foshan is the spiritual home of southern lion dance and the martial art Wing Chun. Around Lunar New Year you'll find lion teams blessing every shopfront from Guangzhou to Hong Kong.

Cantonese Opera

A 300-year-old performance art with elaborate phoenix-and-dragon costumes and stylised falsetto singing — still staged in heritage theatres like Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall.

Slow-Cooked Soup Culture

Cantonese families brew herbal lou fo tong for hours, tuning the ingredients to the season and the drinker's constitution. Most home cooks can recite a dozen recipes by heart.

Lingnan Garden Style

Smaller and more pragmatic than Suzhou's classical gardens — Yu Yin Shan Fang and the Four Famous Gardens of Lingnan show off carved wood screens, cool courtyards and lotus ponds suited to the humid south.

Cities

12 prefecture-level · sorted by tourist popularity
  1. 1

    Guangzhou

    广州Capital

    2,200-year-old provincial capital — yum cha, Shamian Island, Canton Tower, Chen Clan Academy, the Yuexiu Park Five Rams sculpture. The cultural heart of Cantonese-speaking China.

  2. 2

    Shenzhen

    深圳

    From a fishing village in 1980 to a 17-million tech megacity bordering Hong Kong — Huaqiangbei electronics, OCT-Loft art zone, Shekou international harbour, Dapeng coastal villages.

  3. 3

    Foshan

    佛山

    Cradle of Wing Chun (Ip Man, Bruce Lee), Hung Gar (Wong Fei-hung) and Cantonese opera; home to the Foshan Ancestral Temple and the 500-year-old Nanfeng Ancient Kiln.

  4. 4

    Zhuhai

    珠海

    Garden coastal city facing Macau, linked by the 55 km Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge; Hengqin's Chimelong Ocean Kingdom is China's biggest theme-park resort.

  5. 5

    Dongguan

    东莞

    Manufacturing megacity between Guangzhou and Shenzhen; OPLE Museum, Keyuan classical garden and the Songshan Lake science park.

  6. 6

    Zhongshan

    中山

    Hometown of Sun Yat-sen — the Cuiheng birthplace museum, the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, and the Xiaolan chrysanthemum festival every November.

  7. 7

    Kaiping

    开平

    County-level city of Jiangmen famous for the UNESCO-listed Kaiping Diaolou watchtowers and the Chikan Movie Town colonial street.

  8. 8

    Shaoguan

    韶关

    Northern mountain city with the UNESCO Danxiashan geopark, the Nanhua Temple (where the Sixth Patriarch of Chan Buddhism lived), and the Bibo Bay water town.

Famous Locals

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