Heilongjiang is China at its most northerly and most Russian. The province borders Russia along the Amur River (Heilong Jiang — Black Dragon River — gives the province its name), and the Russian influence is not merely historical: the food has dumplings that taste more like pelmeni, the architecture in the older quarters leans toward Orthodox onion domes, and the winters are genuinely Siberian. Temperatures in Harbin, the capital, regularly fall below minus 30°C.
Those winters are also the reason most visitors come. Harbin hosts China's most spectacular winter festival each January: vast sculptures carved from blocks of ice cut from the frozen Songhua River, some the size of cathedrals, lit from within by coloured lights. The Ice and Snow World festival has grown into a major event, but even outside the festival period the city's Russian-era architecture — particularly along Central Street (Zhongyang Dajie) — is genuinely beautiful and unlike anything else in China.
Beyond Harbin, the province offers serious wilderness. The Zhalong Nature Reserve near Qiqihar is one of the best places in China to see red-crowned cranes. The Wudalianchi volcanic lakes in the north are strange and beautiful. In summer the countryside turns intensely green — soya and sunflowers stretching to the horizon — making Heilongjiang a different proposition entirely from its frozen winter identity.
This is not an easy province to travel independently in the remote areas, but it rewards the effort. The food is hearty northeastern cooking: braised pork, pickled cabbage, and dumplings that keep out the cold.
