It’s been almost 6 years since I last visited Suzhou and the city of Suzhou has changed dramatically. Sure, you have the old areas with the canals (unjustifiably promoted as “Venice of the east”) which we all know of, but then you have the amazing new area surrounding the lake. That area, to me, signifies all about the China transformation. It surprised me in scale, comparable to some of the changes in Shenzhen and in Shanghai. Suzhou is a thriving Chinese city and it really shows.
I had a couple of days to roam around and explore and I enjoyed both the old and the new, making for a much more pleasant visit compared to my last. The tourist sites are, as usually with China, completely overrun with the local tourist hordes making it very crowded, but there are a few hidden gems a bit off the beaten track that make it all worth while.
So, here is the visions photo summary of my latest visit to Suzhou, the old and the new…
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