Shangxiajiu Pedestrian Street

Three streets in a line — Shangjiu, Xiajiu and Shidifu — 1,237 m of continuous qilou arcades (shops below, homes above, the pavement running under the first floor), pedestrianised on 30 September 1995 as China's first commercial walking street. The shops under the arcades are chains and gold counters; what you come for is the arcade itself and the teahouses that survive on Shidifu Road: Tao Tao Ju (1880), Lianxianglou (1889, 'first house of lotus-seed paste') and the Guangzhou Restaurant's Wenchang branch. This is where morning tea in Xiguan happens.