Let’s face it: if you’re looking for the kind of five-star trips conjured in glossy travel mags, the ones where you’re never more than five steps from a daiquiri, and all the hotel linens pass the black-light test, Beiing’s outer environs don’t have much for ya. Then again, China Airlines has a non-stop to Paris, and from there it’s a short hop to Monaco and other enclaves of the high-falutin’.

While China’s ‘suburbs’ certainly don’t lack for drabness, there’s always a little surprise just beyond that cluster of squalid storefronts, just behind that freshly-manured field, a surprise snapping its fingers in your face, reminding you you’re on the antipode of your former reality, where strip malls and first-world ennui made you yawn.

Long Qing Xia, gateway to the gorger referred to as “the Guilin of the North”, has enough of these little unexpected pleasures to make it well worth a day trip, if not an overnighter. For those serious about hill-bashing and spelunking, pagoda-gazing and Great Wall tramping, it’s a great launching point and return destination, with a few well-worn hotels in which to recoup between excursions. The rooms will run you from 160RMB for two single beds to 350 RMB for a “suite”, which those with a sense of irony will love for its layout – perfect for a self-important Chinese bureaucrat conference – and it’s 80s era treadmill, complete with attachable fat-jiggling belt.

Then again, the last thing you want to do at Long Qing Xia is count the cigarette burns in your hotel room carpet. A quick jaunt past a dismal parking lot, ad you’ve reached the staging area for the ascent to the gorge, a little well-meaning tourist trap that says “welcome to China’s natural wonder” with the same tacky brio withwhich Coney Island says “Welcome ta Brooklyn”.

A large plaza features a low stage on which Brazilian samba dancers shimmy on warm summer evenings, wile onlookers munch their malatang in appreciation. Flanking the plaza is a man-made river in a trench with a mini waterfall feeding it, for a just-parted Red Sea effect. On its concrete bank is a tiny row of shops turned out in a South China Façade, an homage to Guilin, perhaps.

Ignore the gaudy trinkets and desperate ‘helloes’, and make straight for the end of the row, beyond which lurks a tribute to China’s unselfconscious camp. A green and yellow dragon, easily more than twice two football fields long, clings to a cliff, its head resting at the bottom, jaws agape and beckoning you into its bowels, where a series of escalators take you up to the top of a dam, and the docks from which you board the boats for the lake tour.

So there you are, seated in a vessel designed on the paddleboat model but enlarged to accommodate a good 30 Asians, or 25 Europeans, or 15 Americans. The limestone cliffs towering over you lend a delightful air of isolation, wearing their summer verdure like a green cape on festival day.

Skimming languidly over the emerald lake, you contemplate the countless ravines and rock formations that constitute your shrunken horizon, their reflected image dancing in the water should your gaze drift downward. Temples perch on cliff tops and ledges. What kind of people trudged up these crags to honor their ancestors? What could mar the tranquility of such a scene? How about the tinny soundtracks piping from every boat on the lake? Yes, some official in all his wisdom decided that nature’s sound track would be vastly improved by the under-rated theme from Titanic. Oh, the humanity.

On the far banks of the lake begin the trails that will take you to the Wall, as well as lesser known but more intriguingly named destinations: Mountain-guarding Buddha, Bell Mount, Phoenix Island, East Tachai, Moon Gulf, Giant’s Temple, Jade Emperor Peak. Whether or not these destinations live up to their names, you can at least count on the fact that trekking to them will give you more solitude and communion with nature than the gorge affords, especially on a weekend.

Up for a few thrills? A 50 meter bungee jumping platform awaits the brave and foolish alike on the far bank, as well as an even higher rope spanning a portion of the lake down which you can slide, suspended from a harness. The protracted hoots and wailings of jumpers drift far across the lake like the calls of demented birds, mystifying boaters who can hear but not see the source of the eerie cries. For those who require a more mechanized, less life-threatening approach to views of the gorge from on high, there is both a funicular and a roller coaster track to the top.

Still and all, did you come this far for the rush of adrenaline, or the rush of decompression that floods a body safely removed from the hurly burly of modern life? Depends on your age and previous exposure to theme park recreation.

Funny how quickly an empty stomach drives thoughts of scenic splendor and daredevilry alike from your thoughts. Of course, gratifying a grumbling belly is China’s chief pleasure, and Long Qing Xia has a special treat in store, for those willing to go the extra mile. For those who aren’t, the hotel restaurant Yudu Dajiu suffices, although the price for such standard food reveals the restaurant is well-aware of your lack of easy alternatives.

You’re much better off repairing to Long Qing Xia’s ticket gate and mouthing the following two syllables to the horde of locals hovering just outside: Ma Gang. A raucous melee will ensue, as drivers shove and shout at each other for your business, leaving you felling like the prize ewe in a head-butting contest. 10 RMB will get you a bone-rattling mini van ride to a nearby village and the front door of Ma Gang.

There are plenty of courtyard inns among the villages surrounding Long Qing Xia, but Ma Gang enjoys a special reputation among the locals. But be advised, your dining experience is likely to be much closer to visiting a friend’s courtyard home than a money-making establishment.

You can overnight at Ma Gang, whose quarters are humbler but fresher than the Yu Du Hotel’s at Long Qing Xia, and certainly cheaper, although no prices are given out – all money matters are subject to discussion and relationship. You’ll probably be waking up with the roosters, but it sure beats the sound of construction.

Address:10km northeast of Yanqing County, BeijingAdmission:CNY40Hours: 8:30 am-5:30 pm Tel:0086-10-69191020