The port city of LUSHUN , an hour-long, 40km bus ride south of Dalian, China, makes up for the latter's lack of attention to the past. The small city has remained aesthetically unchanged from its colonial past as Port Arthur. It was here that the Japanese shocked the world by defeating the Russians in a naval battle in 1904. The victory was the beginning of a bloody campaign that you can trace, by train or bus, from Lushun to Dalian to Dandong to Anshan to Shenyang, where the czar at last surrendered in 1905. Northeast China was then in the hands of the Japanese, who ruled the region for the next forty years. Jack London's Reports provides a first-person account of the war and his observations of the "yellow peril", and is more informative than the displays in the region's museums.

Lushun is a quiet place with one main square fronted by Japanese-style buildings, but the reason tourists interested in the Russo-Japanese War should come is to visit the LuShunRiEJianYuJiuZhi ( Lushun Japanese Russian Old Place Exhibition Hall ), actually a prison camp turned museum commemorating those who were interned here (daily 9am-4pm; ¥10). The hall sits on a small hill in the north of town, a five-minute cab ride from the bus station. The tour of the compound and captions of photographs are in Chinese only, and document the conflicting forces that ruled the Liaodong peninsula for the first half of the twentieth century. Half of the camp was built by the Russians in 1902 as a prison for Chinese. From 1905-1945 it was enlarged by Japan, who used it to hold Chinese, Russians and dissidents from Japan opposed to the emperor. Lastly, the Communists used the prison to hold Chinese; you can still read, under the neat squares of burgundy paint attempting to block it out, "Mao Ze Dong Live Forever!" Other slogans of the Cultural Revolution have been painted over throughout the camp. The prison also has a torture room, a gallows with skeletons of victims on display, and a 1914 Model-T Ford that belonged to the Japanese warden, in front of which you can have your picture taken for ¥14.

Lushun also has a Tomb for Russian Martyrs , in memory of the soldiers who died to liberate the city in 1945, located west of the prison. Rows of cannon and other fortifications left by the Japanese sit atop Baiyun Shan (White Cloud Mountain), a hill overlooking the Yellow Sea near the centre of town. From the bus station, it's a short walk, but there's a considerable hike uphill to the battlements.

Buses from Dalian to Lushun make the run in an hour (every 15min; ¥5), departing from a stop in front of the teachers' college. From Lushun, buses leave from the bus station in the centre of town frequently. Buy your ticket from the window in the station (¥6). The road between the towns is lined with old Japanese villas since turned into farmhouses or stables, and you can see the sea for some of the ride. Getting around Lushun, taxi is the best form of transport, with a lift from the bus station to the prison costing ¥5 and a trip up to Baiyun Shan ¥20. Taxis here do not have metres, so agree on the fare beforehand. There are no restaurants near Lushun's sights; however, fruit and noodles can be procured around the bus station and the area fronting the town's central square.