As well as tucking in to some local crayfish delicacies, seek out Hongze Lake fishball soup, Huai’an Pingqiao tofu soup and xiehuangtangbao, a hearty crab roe soup dumpling.

A wealth of cultural and historical rewards awaits visitors to the city of Huai’an, where archaeologists have found evidence of human activity dating back as far as 4000 BC. The city came into its own when its portion of the Grand Canal( the first, incidentally) was constructed around 500 BC, and nods to Huai’an’s prosperity during China’s Canal Age remain even now. Take night cruise along the Huai River and admire sights such as the majestic Qingjiang Canal Lock, built during the Ming dynasty, and the stone Guoshan Stele pavilion, originally built to control traffic on the waterway. As you enjoy the view of these monuments and a traditional pagoda reflected in the moonlight on the water’s surface, you might also be lucky enough to catch fragments of local Huai opera and not-so-local jazz performances from the river’s banks.

Many of the ingredients you’ll fine in Huai’an’s dishes come from nearby Hongze Lake. The fourth-largest freshwater lake in China, Hongze’s waters feed the Grand Canal, and the lake’s bounty is ready for visitors and locals to enjoy cone again following a five- month fishing ban to replenish stocks in2017. In recent decades, crayfish has vecome a national favourite in China-and Hongze is a major source. The lakeside town of Xuyi, just southwest fromHuai’an, even hosts its own crayfish festival, attracting tens of thousands of visitors each spring.

Hongze’s surrounds are charming and offer yet more clues to the area’s history; flagstone paving plots a quiet path through overgrown grass and weeds, which cover ancient dams and causeways in places. The rustic beauty of the lake’s shores is reflected on the water itself, where the traditional wooden boathouses and paddles belonging to local fishermen have become a floating staple of this picturesque landscape.