People going to eastern Shandong Peninsula tend to skip Yantai and only tour the popular Qingdao.They may assume Yantai is a boring place with only apple and grape fields. Even a few locals I consulted told me "there is nothing to see."

My recent weekend exploring Yantai has proved how utterly wrong they are.

Yantai is a beautiful, modern and culturally and historically rich seaside city.

Coming from the concrete jungle known as Shanghai, I felt refreshed soon after leaving Yantai Airport. Lush greenery, blue sky, clean and much less crowded streets started to soothe my mind and body. The seaside drive leading to my hotel along the No.2 bathing beach completed the process.

Leaving my ocean view room behind, I strolled the beach barefoot. The water was already a bit chilly. Only two or three men were swimming or playing in the water. Along the embankment, men young and old some 30 metres apart were fishing, unhurried. In the following days, I saw people angling everywhere. It looks like a favourite pastime in the city and you see fishing gear stores everywhere.

Water at the No.1 and No.2 bathing beaches is good, but not as great as Sanya, Hainan Island. I guess that has to do with the massive ocean farming in Shandong. The fast-growing province launched a programme years ago to build another Shandong on the sea, obviously not taking the fragile ocean ecology into Yantai's
well kept secret consideration.

The East Battery (Dong Paotai), about 2 kilometres from the bathing beach, was my first encounter with Yantai's history.Three formidable Krupp cannons,built in 1893, tower over the bastion. The fortification was designed by a German invited by the Qing Imperial Court.

Here the hill is surrounded by ocean on three sides. The coastline turns serpentine, cliff precipitous and the water clearer.Rocks half submerged and pebbles in the shallow seabed can be seen clearly.

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