Tongkou Village, north of the Jiangyong county seat in a valley of cultivated terraces and forested hills, is one of the county's most atmospheric and least-visited rewards. A Ming dynasty settlement that once had a substantial commercial life, it is now largely depopulated and largely undiscovered, its old buildings — courtyard houses, carved wooden screens, stone-paved lanes — subsiding gently into the hillside.
The landscape around the village is beautiful in the understated way of southern Chinese agricultural land: terraced fields climbing the valley sides, small streams, old stone bridges, persimmon trees in autumn orange. There is no formal entrance fee and no tour group circuit. Getting here requires a driver or accepting the vagaries of local minibuses; the journey from the county town takes about 40 minutes. A quiet morning or afternoon here provides genuine contrast to the packaged heritage sites elsewhere in Hunan.