Shenzhen/East

Eastern Shenzhen has some of the best of Shenzhen's nature, including beaches and mountains, dotted with Hakka villages and other historic sites.

It includes the following districts:


 * Yantian (盐田, Yántián) – home to one of the world's busiest container ports, popular but crowded beaches, and seafood restaurants
 * Longgang (龙岗, Lónggǎng) – suburban development has surrounded the old Hakka villages out in this district
 * Pingshan (坪山, Píngshān) – quiet suburbs where you can walk through the neighborhoods and feel a calmer pace of life than the rest of Shenzhen
 * Dapeng (大鹏, Dàpéng) – getaway destination with quieter beaches and historic sites

Get in
Metro lines 3 and 10 stretch pretty far into Longgang, line 8 provide connections to Yantian, and lines 14 and 16 provide convenient services to Pingshan, but for Dapeng, you're stuck with buses or cars. This means that a trip to Dapeng from downtown Shenzhen is quite an undertaking, and unless you have your own car you may want to spend the night.

More metro lines are under construction.

is in Pingshan, providing services to Xiamen, Fuzhou, Hong Kong and express trains to Shenzhen North station, and is in Longgang, providing long-haul slow services to further places in China.

Beaches
Shenzhen has some of China's best beaches, many of them untouched stretches of National Park, and most of them are in this part of the city. In 2006, Chinese Geographic Magazine named the Dapeng Peninsula, as one of China's top ten most scenic coastlines.



Eat
Sea urchins (海胆 hǎidǎn) are a specialty of Nan'ao (南澳 Nán'ào) town, way out on Dapeng Peninsula. They're best around April and May.

Go next
Back to downtown Shenzhen, or east to the beaches of Huizhou or north to the suburbs of Dongguan.