From honeymoons to high-end tourism

Under a crystal blue sky, beams of sunlight play on the water of the lake. Hundreds of meters away, egrets fly past the reed marshes that surround the water. Five wooden fishing boats are sailing on the lake, with their sails hoisted under the sky.

It's hard to believe that this picturesque scene didn't exist 12 years ago, when the area was just a barren strip of grassland and foul, uninhabited ponds.

"Back then, papermaking plants and cement works just discharged their industrial wastewater directly to the lake. Added to that, with 24 lakeside restaurants and hundreds of local fishermen dumping their kitchen and living waste in it, the water stank," said Ge Wei, director of the Huzhou Taihu Tourist Vacation Zone, recalling what he saw when he arrived in 2006.