You'll forgive me, but this seems a most curious way to arrive at a decision to miss Suzhou and go to Tongli instead. If you want to avoid crowds, then don't go to China. Go somewhere where there are few people, e.g., come out here to the West of the US, like Arizona, where there are plenty of ancient sites, great natural beauty, and very few people.

Any day in Shanghai, while walking the most popular streets or visiting the Shanghai Museum, you will meet with more people or an equal number of people as visiting the gardens of Suzhou.

The Chinese have an old saying: "Above, there is heaven; on earth, there are Suzhou and Hangzhou." There is a very good reason why so many people visit Suzhou, its gardens are unparalleled in China. These are not like English gardens, these are formally laid out gardens designed in classic Chinese styles. The most important concept here is that the garden is a miniature mirror of all nature and so has to contain water, mountains, and plants, even if the "mountains" are just rocks carefully piled and juxtapositioned together. Each garden is arranged in such a way as to afford as many viewpoints as possible. Thus, these gardens are not to be hurried through with a "hum ho, yes, I've seen the Humble Administrator's Garden, now on to the next six gardens."

r_shum gave you very good advice: try not to do too many gardens. In any one day: two is great, four is max, three is optimum. Try the Humble Administrator's Garden, the Master of the Nets Garden, and one/two others. Suzhou is on the World Heritage List because of its gardens. Hope you will be able to enjoy them.

Tongli and Zhouzhuang are being pushed as tourist locations. Remember sometimes there is still some difficulty of getting from point A to point B in China. Suzhou is much easier to get to, despite all the propaganda to get people to visit the "watertowns" of Tongli and Zhouzhuang. (Guess I'm just not much for dirty canals and rivers).

I'm trying to think of an equivalent example and coming up with a poor one: what you are planning to do is to skip Paris and go to Giverny.

I'd suggest going to Suzhou for its gardens and Hangzhou for its scenery. If you have more days, go and visit any number of the towns outside of Shanghai: Tongli, Zhouzhuang, Shaoxing, Ningbo, etc.

Oh, BTW, the other thing that Suzhou is famous for is silk. Most museums have a museum shop strategically placed at the end/exit, so as to entice you to buy something. You really don't have to buy anything, but the silk museum is interesting.

Have a nice trip!

I agree with easytraveler. One should visit Suzhou before going to one of the watertowns. The information I give is simply which watertown to go, but if you haven't been to Suzhou, then go there first.

A vote also for Suzhou.. the water town visits are always as an extension to Suzhou not instead of..

Xitang is somewhere between Shanghai and Hangzhou. If you only have one day to spend outside of Shanghai, then you probably should choose Suzhou. Though being a Chinese myself, I find those watertowns more interesting than Suzhou and Hangzhou because the watertowns represent a way of life while the West Lake in Hangzhou is just a scenery and the gardens in Suzhou aren't truely unique either(maybe they are, just not up to my expectation I guess). All these places are easily accessable from Shanghai if you are willing to pay a little bit more for a taxi. I think you can learn a lot more about the watertowns if you use a local guide (not sure English speaking guides are available or not. )

If you all recall the initial inquiry of this posting was a question on the feasibility of walking around Suzhou without a guide. As the replies appeared the subject of seeing the water towns came up. We moved from the "Disneyfication" of Zhouzhuang to the authenticity of Tonglii and even more so of Xitang. Thrown into the mix was a posting by Rkkwan about the overly noisy and disruptive crowds in Suzhou. With all this in mind I feel I've made an error in my decision making. Easyrider has brought me back to a basic premise, Suzhou is not to be compared to the small, but interesting , water towns in that area. After considering Easyrider's thoughts and doing further reading I feel Suzhou stands by itself as a special gem that China has to offer. Crowds don't bother me, otherwise I wouldn't be going to China for a month. However, disruptive crowds that don't allow you to appreciate the beauty of the moment does put me off. With this said the the uniqueness of Suzhou beckons me and I will take my chances. The other water towns will wait for a future trip. Thank you all for your time and help.

A quick apology - I kept referring to Easyrider in my last post, I meant to write Easytraveler. Please accept my apologies for the error.

hmbpa: no need to apologize, but your gracious apology is accepted anyhow!

I choose "easytraveler" instead of "easyrider" because I'm not especially good on horses or motorcycles.

Glad you are choosing Suzhou after all. Certainly hope the crowds will be bearable for you. If this is your first trip, then I'd venture to say that you have made a good choice. Please save the excellent recommendations and advice from the other Fodorites for your second trip to China. It is such a huge country with so much to see, you'll probably want to go back.

Enjoy China and take lots of pictures!

From experience, I could recommend a day trip to Suzhou from Shanghai. The train from Shangai to Suzhou was very efficient and very comfortable (it is worth travelling 1st class (or equivalent) and better to pre-book your seats. Very reasonable - especially when compared to hiring a car/driver.
Better to decide which gardens to visit before you arrive - saves time and remember that a rickshaw is very useful (agree a price before the journey!).
A picnic saves time. Enjoy.

Pat

I'd recommend Suzhou if you like experiences as much as sights. We were there last October and noticed few Caucasians and mostly Asian tourists.

As mentioned earlier, it is a smaller city and one can see and experience a little of daily life and shopping in a more traditional way. I did not find the Humble Administrator's Garden as enjoyable as one of the smaller ones but that's because I like small as opposed to big. We were also a little put off with all the vinyl potted mums as we first walked in. But hey, Í'd suggest you go there and one small garden.

The silk factory for us was very interesting because of the tour leader we had who explained from start to finish how silk is made and spun. Seeing it go from cocoon stage to silk made it even more interesting.

The embroidery was for us fascinating when you think the Chinese have been doing this kind of intricate artwork for thousands of years. To see one person work one piece of embroidery with a scene on on side and coming out with say some dogs on the others was astouding. But never were we pushed in any way to make a purchases. Several of our group of ten made purchases of silk duvets (including ourselves). So light and warm.

The canal trip with our group (10 in all) was fun also gave us an inside view of life along the river. From Suzhou we took a soft sleeper to Qu'ful, home of Confucius.



liked was not even the gardens but it's smallness - for Chinasif about 2M people is small, and as far as I can remember

Suzhou correction

Sorry, somehow my reply got posted by wandering fingers before I could read what I had written.
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Please ignore the last comment starting with "liked was not even the gardens but it's smallness - for Chinasif about 2M people is small, and as far as I can remember"

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Suzhou was probably my favourite city in China. Our group of ten was terrific and actually made our trip more interesting than had we travelled alone.

Sorry I can't advise on distances. Frankly I can't see Shanghai (as beautiful as it is) for five days; maybe four and two in Suzhou.