珠海市

Why this place

Zhuhai is the city across the border from Macao, China, and it was planned as a garden city — wide, green and low-rise compared with Shenzhen. It is the easiest place to live on the Pearl River estuary, with a long seafront and a very large collection of islands.

What to see

• The Fisher Girl statue and the Lovers' Road coastal promenade
• The Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge, the longest sea crossing in the world
• Wailingding and the other islands of the Zhuhai archipelago
• The New Yuanming Palace, a full-scale reconstruction of Beijing's Old Summer Palace — an odd but interesting project

What to eat

• Zhuhai seafood, especially the estuary oysters and the local fish
• Hengqin and the border area have strong Cantonese and Macanese-influenced food

Best time

October–December and March–April