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Lying on the East China seaboard where the Yellow River empties into the sea, Shandong Province forms a
part of a large peninsula that thrusts far out into the Yellow Sea, with its distinctive eagles beak promontory.
Along its 3,000-kilometre coastline are 25 ports, the largest
being Qingdao, Rizhao, Weihai, Yantai and Longkou.
The province has an area of 156, 7000 square kilometres and a population of 86,432,000. The
provincial capital is Jinan, a rail and highway hub in western Shandong now connected by a newly
completed 318- kilometre expressway with Qingdao, the largest port on the Shandong coast.
Climate: Shandong enjoys a warm-temperate
monsoonal climate, with hot, rainy summers and dry, sunny winters. In winter, it is more humid and warm in Shandong than
in north China. Its coastal and inland regions experience a sharp difference in climate.
Shandong has a mean annual temperature of 12º14ºC, increasing from the north-eastern seaboard
to the west and the south, and a mean annual precipitation of 500-900 millimetres or more, increasing from north-west to
south-east.
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Premonitory near Wendeng |
Geography: Shandong with peninsular and mainland elements may be divided into four
geographical zones:
A. The Northwestern Shandong Plain, formed mainly by the deposits of the Yellow River, is part
of the North China Plain. Crisscrossed by the Yellow River and the Grand Canal, it is an important farming area;
B.
The Jiaolai Plain between the central-south Shandong and the Jiaodong hilly regions is bounded by sea bays on its
northern and southern tips and is traversed by the Jiaolai, Weihe and Dagu rivers;
C. The Central-South Shandong
hilly area is
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Mount Taishan |
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elevated in the middle and slopes gently in four directions. Over 1,000 metres above sea level, it is
comprises the Taishan, Lushan, Yishan and Mengshan mountain ranges;
D. The Jiaodong Hilly Area is the main part of
the Shandong Peninsula.
The Yellow River and the
Grand Canal are the major waterways. The Shandong section of the Yellow River is 600 kilometres long, flowing northeast
until it flows into the Bohai Sea east of Lijin. The section of the Grand Canal in this province totals about 500
kilometres in length. It flows from north to south across the plain in the west where it joins the Yellow River.
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Tourism: With beautiful natural landscapes and numerous historical and cultural relics, Shangdong
has rich tourist resources. It offers a string of tourist attractions, such as Mount Taishan and the Temple, Mansion and
Cemetery of Confucius, two World Heritage sites; Lingzi, capital of the ancient Qi State; Penglai, the well known
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Penglai, the reknowned 'fairyland on earth' |
‘fairyland on earth’; Mount Laoshan, a sacred land of Taoism; Weifang, the ‘world capital of kites’;
Qingdao, a charming coastal city famous for its annual International Beer Fair; Yantai, known worldwide as a wine
producer; Rongcheng, a place considered as ‘the edge of the world’ by ancient Chinese; Jinan, the provincial
capital honored as ‘the city of springs’; and the site for watching the wonderful scene of the torrential Yellow River
merging with the sea.
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