12 places to live differently

A Bai heritage town framed by rice paddies — old courtyards, slow days

A riverside ancient town — quieter than Fenghuang, deeper than you'd expect

A remote trekking village where alpine lakes meet snow-capped peaks

Where the Songhua meets the Heilongjiang — China's river-border frontier

Sacred alpine lake and Tuvan villages in Northern Xinjiang's wild frontier

China's last frontier town on the Pamir Plateau

Sichuan's "Corridor of Light and Shadow" — a photographer's paradise on the Tea Horse Road

China's last matriarchal society, cradled by a sapphire highland lake

A quiet Li-village hidden beneath Yinggeling's rainforest canopy

Qinghai's "Little Switzerland" — alpine grasslands beneath Zhuo'er Mountain

A fairy-tale Tuvan village where mist curls through pointed wooden cabins

Dragon-back terraces carved into the clouds for over 650 years