Unusually for China, Sanya evokes a sense of space. Many work at tea and coffee plantations set up by returning expats. The countryside is populated with all sorts of people: ethnic minorities from far-flung corners of the People's Republic plus some Buddhist mountain-dwellers. You will soon discover that, despite the tourist boom, Hainan remains one of China's poorer provinces. For the semi-adventurous, Sanya is well placed for a trip into the countryside just rent a cab for a day from your resort. Bright green fields stretch back as if they were the mountains' shadows on the land, dotted with the occasional water buffalo. Hainan's hills reach horizontally, not vertically. Slim, dark coconut palms lean in clusters like supermodels taking a cigarette break. Forget short, sprawling peach blossoms - Hainan's trees are 25m tall. The island shares the same latitude as Antigua and Hawaii, and its vegetation is not what you expect in China. After the eunuch greys and hierarchical reds of Beijing, Hainan is a feast of wilderness. Hainan has long attracted a diverse bunch of people, as I found when I left the beach to explore more of the countryside around Sanya. And many feel they have made healthy decisions choosing Hainan over the obvious (and more choking) industrial cities. Many have left behind spouses, children and parents. Most of the staff are migrant workers who have travelled from across China to try to get a slice of Hainan's tourism boom. Gordon Jin spoke excellent English, which placed him in a minority at the hotel. Unlike such quarters in most hotels, this had actually been occupied by ex-president Jiang Zemin, as well as the current premier Wen Jiabao. Our first stop was the Presidential Suite. But in return for my interest, Mr Jin led me on a tour of the hotel. Anyway, he assured me that the hotel was working to protect the coral in the bay that a colony of rhesus monkeys in the grounds was looked after and that as much water as possible was recycled. The manager's was Gordon Jin - someone was having a laugh when they dished out the titles here. It is customary in China's up-market hospitality industry for staff to adopt an English name. The Shanhaitian advertised itself as an "eco-hotel", so I sought out the duty manager to find out why. Our hotel emulated the idea with an impressive Brazilian grill every night on a veranda overlooking the ocean. Unlike most beaches, Dadong Hai becomes more crowded after dark each evening old ladies from the town set up barbecues on the sand. Sitting on small stalls, biting king prawns and smoked tofu off barbecue skewers and washing it all down with beer or rice wine, wanderers from the mainland flirt with each other. A noodle bar brushes against boxes of fuschia dragon fruit at a dazzling tropical produce stand. But for the Western tourist, Sanya is no ordinary package destination.Īs dusk falls in town the street market comes to life. This is luxury on a budget, and the hotels are staffed by members of China's apparently limitless labour force. Chinese four- and five-star hotels line the beach and competition is steep so rates are low my room cost £28 a night with a sea view and breakfast, well below the going rate for a basic room in any of China's major cities. Da Dong Hai is less intimate, and its resorts are not so refined. Several international resort hotels have been built here and more are set to open in the coming months. Ya Long Wan is a private, secluded 7km strip of white sand and translucent ocean. Sanya's Ya Long Wan (Asian Dragon Bay) and Da Dong Hai (Large Oriental Sea) are two of China's most beautiful beaches. Even the country's current emperors - the Communist Party leaders - flock there for their holidays. But overwhelmingly the fun-seekers are China's own rising middle class. Sure, some tourists dribble in from around the region: South Korea, Russia, Japan. The occasional glimpse of a bicycle pedalling gently along the side of one of Beijing's meanest ring roads may restore your sense of calm, but travelling in China can be damned hard work.Īs a "China away from China", Hainan has recaptured the imagination of those squeezed into the nation's cities. But don't imagine that a whizz through Beijing, Shanghai and a night with the Terracotta Army is going to be a relaxing holiday. No visit to China will fail to fascinate. The people who populate the People's Republic are battling through immense change some are thriving, others just trying to cope. China is a nation in perpetual fast-forward.
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