CTS Tours
China Travel Specialists, Auckland NZ
Just 45km from central Shanghai, Zhujiajiao is a 1,700-year-old water town with stone bridges, canal gondolas, and Ming Dynasty streets. Here's how to visit without turning it into a tourist conveyor belt.
Forty-five kilometres west of Shanghai's city centre, accessible by direct bus in under an hour, Zhujiajiao has been a functioning town on the waterways of the Jiangnan delta for approximately 1,700 years. It reached its commercial peak during the Ming and Qing Dynasties as a rice and cotton trading hub, and the town that survives today — the canal network, the 36 stone bridges, the riverside merchant houses — dates substantially from that period.
The Jiangnan water towns — of which Zhujiajiao, Wuzhen, Tongji, and Xitang are the most visited — share a common geography: a flat delta landscape crossed by canals that historically served as the road network, with towns built along the water's edge. The architecture is a consistent style of whitewashed walls, black tile roofs, and wooden storefronts opening directly onto narrow lanes.
Zhujiajiao's defining feature among the water towns is its bridges. Fangsheng Bridge, built in 1571, is the longest five-arched stone bridge in the Shanghai region — 72 metres, still carrying foot traffic as it has for over four centuries. Standing on it and looking along the canal in either direction at dawn or dusk is one of the classic Jiangnan views.
Arrive before 9am. The tour buses from Shanghai begin arriving from 9:30am, and by 10am the main canal street (Xijing Street) is densely crowded. The town before the crowds is a different experience — local residents going about their morning routines, shopkeepers setting up, the light on the water still soft.
Take a gondola ride early. Wooden gondolas with a single standing rower are available at several points along the main canal. A 20-minute ride costs CNY 80 for the whole boat (up to 6 people). The view from water level — under the stone bridges, past the willow trees trailing into the canal, with the old houses rising directly from the water's edge — is what Zhujiajiao is for.
Explore the back lanes. The main canal street is commercial and increasingly tourist-oriented. The smaller lanes running perpendicular to the water are where the town lives: residents' washing hung between buildings, cats sleeping on doorsteps, the occasional traditional craft workshop still operating.
Visit the City God Temple and Catholic Church. Two religious buildings that tell you something about the town's history: the City God Temple (a Daoist site on an island in the middle of the town's lake) and the Church of Ascension (a 1863 Catholic church built by Jesuit missionaries from Shanghai), both within easy walking distance of each other. The coexistence is very Jiangnan.
Zhujiajiao is included as an optional excursion on our Shanghai & Surroundings Discovery tour. It also pairs naturally with a morning in Suzhou or an afternoon in Hangzhou as part of a Jiangnan region exploration.
Join thousands of New Zealand travellers receiving expert guides, travel tips, and exclusive tour offers — straight to your inbox.
No spam, unsubscribe anytime. We send one email per week at most.
The Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding is home to over 100 giant pandas. Baker Gu shares what to book, what time to arrive, and how CTS adds exclusive access most visitors never get.
A Yangtze River cruise through the Three Gorges is unlike any other river journey in the world. Baker Gu explains what the cruise experience is actually like, what changed after the Three Gorges Dam, and who it suits.
Discover our carefully curated tours that bring the stories and destinations featured in this guide to life
Let our experts craft your perfect China experience
