Rice fields, bandits and baroque watchtowers — two days on backroads through villages and the extraordinary diaolou of Kaiping — where the Gold Rush came home.
Friday–Sunday on various dates — check the Calendar of Rides, or suggest your own dates
3 days / 2 nights
RMB 3,500 per person
Single Supplement: RMB 450
Train tickets from Hong Kong: approximately RMB 290 each way, second class
Group size: Maximum 12 riders
Cycling 50 km on the Saturday, 25 km on Sunday – back roads and farmers pathways – mostly flat
Email bruce@bikeaways.com or mailto:funkygoldendragon to enquire about availability.
Click here for Booking, Payment and Cancellation Conditions
Getting there from Hong Kong
For those travelling together, we meet at Hong Kong West Kowloon High Speed Rail Station at 5:00 pm and aim to take the 6:00 pm train, changing at Guangzhou South and arriving at Kaiping South at around 8:30 pm.
You can also join independently from Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Kaiping or elsewhere in China. We will arrange to pick you up from Kaiping South train station or the bus station.
Train tickets are not included in the tour price and generally become available 15 days before travel. You can book your own through Trip.com, or Bike Aways can arrange them for you.
If suitable train tickets are unavailable, the cross-border bus provides a straightforward alternative, with a slightly later arrival in Kaiping.
For the return on Sunday, there is normally a direct late-afternoon train from Kaiping South to Hong Kong West Kowloon, arriving at around 8:00 pm.
Background
In the late 1800s, people from the Four Counties of the Pearl River Delta began abandoning the sacred mission to grow rice, weave silk and generally be good peasants — instead setting sail down the Pearl River for Macau and Hong Kong.
From there they boarded steamers for the Gold Mountain — Gam Saan — the name given to the goldfields and cities of the American West.
The Gold Rush was on.
Some hit it rich, and with fortunes in their pockets, began a mini-reversal of the great South China diaspora.
Along with new ideas, they brought with them a taste for gold-rush-era architecture – lots of flounce and baroque mixed with Corinthian columns, overlaid onto traditional Chinese forms. Venetian archways were wildly popular and suited the muggy climate.
Bandits had for a long time been a problem in the Pearl River Delta – and all of this newly imported bullion was like an open invitation to children into the lolly shop.
Towers called diaolou were built to watch out for them – baroque ones – that also let everyone know the returnees’ status as worldly and Cosmopolitan peoples..
These are a few of the Diaolou.
They had a little hey-day from the Gold Rush through Art Deco to fall into disrepair with the Depression, and later the war with the Japanese, becoming immensely unfashionable after the 1949 Communist Revolution,
Highlights of the trip
Two days of flat, easy backroad riding along farmers’ pathways through the rice fields and bamboo groves of an almost forgotten backwater of the Pearl River Delta.
A two-wheel exploratory of the 1920s east-meets-west, Art Deco-inspired architectural gems of the returned-Chinese — Diaolou watchtowers and Yanglou mansions.
Eclectic accommodation in Tangkou — part hotel, part museum, cobbled together from old offices, factories and shopfronts by pioneers in the revival of the town’s architectural heritage.
Food — rustic farmhouse lunches, dim sum, Taishanese cooking and big Cantonese meals shared around the table, including the famous Magang goose.
Hipster coffee culture in an old soy sauce factory.
The forgotten, unrenovated Diaolou are our favourites — but we visit the grand UNESCO-listed clusters as well.
Itinerary
Friday
Meet up at Hong Kong West Kowloon Station at 4pm for a 5pm train departure — or make your own way to Kaiping. We’ll pick you up from the train or bus station.
Check in to our charming countryside inn in Tangkou, a laid-back village surrounded by rice paddies, historic diaolou watchtowers and old southern Chinese shopfronts. Spend the evening wandering quiet lanes, soaking up village life and enjoying views across the countryside.
Saturday
An introduction to the Diaolou with a rambling cycle exploration of those most local to us. We cycle onwards to Majianglong — one of the UNESCO-listed Diaolou clusters, with some of the most iconic towers in the region — then loop through the Guangdong Greenway and onto braided farmers’ pathways along the edge of the Tan River.
It’s an Everglades-like environment where you navigate by watchtowers poking their way out of the tangled riverine vegetation.
Lunch is a rustic farmer-style meal with a local family near Ruishi Lou — the tallest and grandest of all the Diaolou, and infrequently visited due to its more remote location.
Sunday
Cycle to Zili Village — the most famous Diaolou cluster — then a soy sauce factory that has somehow become a hipster coffee destination.
From there we ride around the outskirts of Chikan, the old river port on the Tan, with its historic riverfront and shopfront streets, finishing up at the Gatsby-like folly of the famous Li Gardens.
After a delicious final lunch we transfer to Kaiping South train station or the bus station for the journey home.
Included
Meals from Saturday morning, twin-share accommodation (single supplement available for RMB 450 per night), quality mountain bike, two days guided cycling and support, tickets to all the UNESCO Dialoou clusters as mentioned in the itinerary.
Getting there
Kaiping is on the western side of the Pearl River Delta, and while we have a Hong Kong meet-up at West Kowloon High Speed Rail Station, there are plenty of other ways to join us along the way.
From Hong Kong, it’s around three hours by train, changing at Guangzhou South — roughly an hour to Guangzhou, time to change trains (and eat), then another hour on to Kaiping South Station.
From Guangzhou Airport, Kaiping is around two hours southwest by private car, or considerably longer by public transport.
From Zhuhai, just across the border from Macau, it’s around 1 hour 40 minutes by road. Both Zhuhai and Macau have airports.
From Zhongshan, it’s about an hour by car. Zhongshan also has ferry connections with Hong Kong.
And Jiangmen is only about 40 minutes away, with cross-border bus connections from Hong Kong.
Wherever you’re coming from, let us know your plans and we’ll coordinate a pick-up from Kaiping South train station or the bus station.
To Book
Contact bruce@bikeaways.com to reserve your place.
Payment and Booking conditions
