Find your bearings
Sanya – the premium holiday resort at the tip of tropical, mountainous Hainan Island in southern China – was known in ancient times as ‘the end of sky and ocean’. Today, the two collide beautifully on its long stretch of beach in front of Mandarin Oriental, Sanya. Hainan is variously described as China’s Hawaii and China’s Florida: days here should involve long lazy sessions on its sugar-white sands, pausing only to sip from a coconut or splash about in aquamarine waters.
Feed your mind
Sanya’s culture has long revolved around the water, which is perhaps why the Nanshan Temple, an important Buddhist shrine, overlooks the gorgeous South China Sea. The low-slung, winged roofs of the temple are joined by the imposing three-sided Guan Yin Buddha statue, taller than the Statue of Liberty and slightly further out on the sea. Tian Ya Hai Jiao – ‘the end of the world’ – is an inelegant (but arresting) cluster of boulders embedded into Sanya’s golden sands. It’s been namechecked in various Chinese romance poems, and as a result is a popular spot for couples. Look out for inscriptions and poems carved into the rocks.