Tour in China,China Travel Guide,Travel China Tips

The Xiamen International Marathon is held at the first Saturday every January since 2003. It is one of the two leading Marathon competitions of China and an international marathon race that attracts the eyes of the world. The competition consists of full marathon, half marathon, 10-km and 5-km races. The number of participations is over 20,000 every year, and has already reached 30,000 in 2009. There are over 40 television stations home and abroad rebroadcasting the competition which attracts more and more people coming to visit the beautiful city and participate in the competition.     

Wuyi Mountain is known for its crystal water and Danxia landscape. In Wuyi Mountain, tourists can not only enjoy the beautify scenery, but feel the profound culture. It was listed on the World Nature Heritage Site List in 1999. The total area listed on the World Nature Heritage Site List is 999.75 square kilometers, making it the largest world natural heritage in China.

The Overseas Chinese Museum is a building of national features with a building area of more than 3,000 square meters, displaying more than 7000 exhibits. The museum is presided and founded by Tan Kah-kee, a well-known leader of overseas Chinese, as well as countrymen residing abroad and returning overseas Chinese. It is started in 1956 and opened to the public in May of 1959.

Gulangyu Island covers an area of 1.78 square kilometers and stands opposite to Xiamen City across the sea. Xiagu strait is called Egret River. With beautiful sceneries, Gulangyu Island is accredited as "garden on the sea", "architecture exhibition of ten thousand nations", "hometown of music" and "island of piano". It is one of the most attractive landscapes of Xiamen tourist spots. It is a national-level key scenic area and the representative of Xiamen scenic spots. It is on the top list of ten excellent scenic areas of Fujian Province and one of the 35 logo tourist spots all over the country. The whole island is full of natural scenic spots and its main scenic spots include the Crag of Sunlight, Garden of Beans (Shuzhuang Huayuan), Bright Moon Garden (Haoyueyuan) and Yuyuan Garden.

South Putuo Temple is an ancient temple with great fame in Xiamen. It has the name of Southern Putuo for the reason of its main conformity to Guanyin and Bodhisattva as well as its location to the south of Putuo Mountain, one of the four great Buddhist fields in Zhoushan of Zhejiang province.

Hulishan Fortress is a nationally key historical and cultural site. In August, 2000, it is listed into "the complete collection of Guinness World Records of the year 2000". The Fortress, built in the 20th year of the emperor Guangxu's reign (1894), has more than 100 years' gloomy history of rise and fall. The base of the fortress is made of the mixture of camphor tree sap, liquid brown sugar, glutinous rice, clay and sand. Therefore, it is rather solid. The fortress is composed of the barracks, the secret tunnel, commanding tower, sentry platform, the ammunition depot, the trench, the castle, etc. The rectangular castle made of granite rocks occupies an area of 13,000 square meters. Xiamen had been an ancient battlefield where Xiamen people resisted imperial aggressors in the history. It played an important role in resisting foreign aggressors. There are east and west emplacements with two main cannons (only one left now) bought from the Krupp Company of Germany. The whole length of the cannon is 13.13 meters and its weight is 50 tons. The caliber of the cannon is 280 mm and its maximum range of fire is 16,000 meters. The fortress displays more than 50 iron cannons of the Ming Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty unearthed from the Xiamen waters and the building site of capital construction. The East and West emplacements are connected by a tunnel. There are military camps at the exits of the tunnel.  As a coastal defense fortress, there is a trench outside and a patrolling path inside.