Description

The economic heart of South China, the Pearl River Delta is both agriculturally and financially fertile and is one of the most developed parts of China. Intensely cultivated land is interspersed with some of China's newest and fastest-growing cities, which are linked by some of the country's best and most integrated transport services. The Delta's location makes it a popular trip from Hong Kong and a major gateway to enter China itself. Foremost among the Delta's gang of youthful upstart cities is Shenzhen, which was the first of China's Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and has grown from nothing to challenge the traditional heart of the region, Guangzhou, in less than 30 years. While Shenzhen has little in the way of historic sights, it offers shopping, skyscrapers and theme parks along with some insight as to what China's future looks like. Seventy miles to the north, Guangzhou has a longer history, but is also reaping the economic whirlwind. It's definitely worth a quick stop for its blend of Cantonese cuisine, markets, colonial relics and the gritty taste of a real Chinese city. With a population of seven million and long known in the West as Canton, modern Guangzhou provides many visitors with their first glimpse of a mainland Chinese city. Frenetically busy, polluted and steamily hot in summer, Guangzhou's conventional sights are comparatively sparse, but the city is renowned worldwide for its cooking and is worth visiting on these grounds alone. Before Hong Kong rose to

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