Crossing the Guangji Bridge, where Chaozhou meets the river

In the old city of Chaozhou, the Guangji Bridge (广济桥) has crossed the Han River for more than 800 years. Begun in the Southern Song dynasty, it is counted among the oldest bridges in China — and one of the strangest, in the best way.

Most of it is solid stone, a procession of piers topped with small pavilions. But the central section could never be finished in stone; the current was too strong. So the builders did something ingenious: they linked wooden boats across the gap to form a floating span. Each evening the boats could be drawn aside to let river traffic through, and re-linked at dawn. A bridge that opens in the middle.

A working monument

For centuries Guangji Bridge was not a monument but infrastructure — the way goods and people moved in and out of Chaozhou, lined with shops and stalls until it was a market in itself. There is a local saying that to come to Chaozhou and not see the bridge is to have not really come at all.

Restored and floodlit, the bridge today is the postcard image of the homeland — the place diaspora families photograph when they return to find where their grandparents came from. Stand on it at dusk, watch the boats of the central span swing into place, and you are standing on a thousand small returns.