All 16 prefectures
Pick a corner of Yunnan
Yunnan is bigger than Germany and borders Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam. Most visitors see two towns. Tap any region to see how locals do it: where to go, what to eat and what to skip.
Colors show how far off the usual path each region is.
KunmingStone Forest · Green Lake
DaliErhai · Shaxi
LijiangOld town · Lugu Lake
DiqingShangri-La · Meili
XishuangbannaJinghong · rainforest
HongheYuanyang · Jianshui
YuxiFuxian Lake
BaoshanTengchong · Heshun
QujingLuoping canola
ChuxiongHeijing salt town
Pu'erJingmai tea mountain
WenshanPuzhehei · Bamei
DehongMangshi · Ruili
ZhaotongDashanbao cranes
LincangWa villages · tea
NujiangBingzhongluo
- Classic
- Worth the trip
- Off the grid
Map: Chk2011 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Classic
The famous names — done the way locals do them.
Classic · 昆明
Kunming
Yunnan's easygoing capital, where the province's noodles, flowers and old lanes meet.
Classic · 大理
Dali, Erhai & Shaxi
Erhai's Bai villages, then the caravan towns and salt villages most visitors never reach.
Classic · 丽江
Lijiang & Lugu Lake
A Naxi old town, snow-peak villages and Lugu Lake, best taken one valley at a time.
Classic · 迪庆
Shangri-La & Meili (Diqing)
Tibetan Yunnan: Shangri-La's monastery town and the long road north to Meili.
Classic · 西双版纳
Xishuangbanna
Dai temples, rainforest walks and night-market dinners in Yunnan's tropical south.
Worth the trip
Where people go once they have done the classics.
Worth the trip · 红河
Yuanyang terraces & Jianshui (Honghe)
Hani rice terraces, a walled tofu town and the city behind crossing-the-bridge noodles.
Worth the trip · 玉溪
Fuxian Lake (Yuxi)
Kunming's weekend lake: deep, clear Fuxian, fishing villages and copper-pot fish.
Worth the trip · 保山
Tengchong (Baoshan)
Tengchong's volcanoes and hot springs, and Heshun, a village built by Burma traders.
Worth the trip · 曲靖
Luoping canola fields (Qujing)
Karst peaks rising out of Luoping's canola fields, plus a copper-boom old town up north.
Worth the trip · 楚雄
Heijing salt town (Chuxiong)
A salt town in a gorge, eroded earth pillars and the Yi Torch Festival, west of Kunming.
Worth the trip · 普洱
Jingmai tea mountain (Pu’er)
The tea's namesake: World Heritage tea forests, Bulang villages and dawn seas of cloud.
Worth the trip · 文山
Puzhehei & Bamei (Wenshan)
Karst peaks over lotus lakes at Puzhehei, and a Zhuang valley you enter by boat.
Off the grid
Remote and slow: buses work if you have time; a driver saves days.
Off the grid · 德宏
Mangshi & Ruili (Dehong)
Golden pagodas, palm-lined streets and Burmese milk tea on the Myanmar border.
Off the grid · 昭通
Dashanbao cranes (Zhaotong)
Wintering cranes, cloud seas and charcoal skewers on Yunnan's cold northeast plateau.
Off the grid · 临沧
Wa hills & Bingdao tea (Lincang)
Wa hill villages, ancient rock art and the tea mountains behind Bingdao pu'er.
Off the grid · 怒江
Nujiang canyon (Nujiang)
A deep river canyon of Lisu and Nu villages, where churches and temples share the slopes.