Halfway along Guangdong 's 800km coastline, rivers from all over the province and beyond disgorge themselves into the South China Sea through the tropically fertile Pearl River Delta , one of China's most densely cultivated areas. Perched right at the delta's northern apex and adjacent to Hong Kong and the Portuguese enclave at Macau, the provincial capital, Guangzhou , provides many travellers with their first taste of mainland China. Unfortunately, high prices and thorough industrialization prompt most visitors to flee not just Guangzhou but the entire province on the first available transport. Resist the temptation: once you've found your bearings, Guangzhou's world-famous food merits a stop, as does an assortment of museums, monuments and shopping, along with the action surrounding one of China's best produce markets . The Pearl River Delta itself has a few patches of green and some history to pick up in passing, but the major targets are the cities of Shenzhen and Zhuhai , modern, purpose-built economic buffer zones at the crossings into Hong Kong and Macau.

Farther afield, the rest of the province is far more picturesque, with a mass of sights from Buddhist temples to Stone-Age relics to slow you down around Shaoguan , up north by the Hunan and Jiangxi borders. Over in the east near the border with Fujian, the former colonial treaty port of Shantou is the springboard for journeying up through some beautiful countryside to the ancient towns of Chaozhou and Meizhou . Travelling west into Guangxi Province, Zhaoqing sports well-touristed but impressive formalized lake and hill landscapes, while those heading towards Hainan need to aim for the disjointed, bland ferry port of Zhanjiang , down in Guangdong's southwestern extremities.

Guangdong Province has a generous quantity of rail and road traffic, and getting around is none too difficult, though securing anything better than a hard seat on a train can be well-nigh impossible. Rail lines run north through Shaoguan and up into Hunan and central China, east to Meizhou and Shantou, and west through Zhaoqing to Zhanjiang and Guangxi. River travel is something of a highlight of the province, as this is one of the last regions in China where public ferries are still in regular use. The best-known service runs up the Xi River from Guangzhou to Wuzhou in Guangxi Province, but others worth trying include an excursion from the northern town of Qingyuan to some riverside temples, and the trip down the Han River from remote northeastern Guangdong to Chaozhou. For the truly adventurous, there's even the seasonal thrill of white-water rafting on a wild section of river northwest of Shaoguan. As for the climate , summers can be sweltering across the province, while winter temperatures get decidedly nippy up in the northern ranges, though it's more likely to be miserably wet than to snow, except around the highest mountain peaks.