Pineapple Sea 菠萝的海

About Pineapple Sea

Xuwen lies at the southern tip of mainland China, with the South China Sea to the east, the Qiongzhou Strait and Hainan across the water to the south, the Gulf of Tonkin to the west and Leizhou city to the north. The county overview lists the Pineapple Sea scenic spot at Qujie town among Xuwen's ecological landscape features, and describes it as gently undulating and coloured through all four seasons. It was named one of Zhanjiang's eight new scenic views in 2013, and in 2016 the magazine China National Geography ran a feature on it, stating that Xuwen had made from pineapples a magnificent landscape it called rare in China. A pineapple inn, a cycling track and Longmen tourism village have been built at the site, and six Xuwen pineapple culture and tourism festivals were held between 2016 and 2020.

The crop that makes the view has a documented history here. People from Xuwen brought pineapple seedlings back from abroad in 1926 and spread their cultivation at Yugonglou in Qujie town. Before 1949 the plants were grown chiefly for coarse fibre used in weaving cloth; after 1978 the trade turned to shipping fresh fruit north; and in 1985 the county changed its growing season to encourage off-season production, after which the county's account records a pattern of year-round supply. Xuwen now has 16,800 hectares of quality pineapple base, spread over Qujie, Xiaqiao, Qianshan, Xiayang, Longtang, Jinhe, He'an and Chengbei townships. The Bali cultivar accounts for more than 75 per cent of plantings, yields run at about 52 tonnes a hectare, and the bulk of the fruit reaches the market in April and May. The county puts its annual output at about 43 per cent of Guangdong's total and about a third of China's. Yugonglou pineapple was approved as a national geographical-indication protected product in 2005.

What to look for

• The tableland fields around Qujie town, which the county describes as gently undulating and coloured through all four seasons.
• Yugonglou in Qujie town, where seedlings brought from abroad were spread in 1926 and whose pineapple was approved as a national geographical-indication protected product in 2005.
• The cycling track, the pineapple inn and Longmen tourism village built at the scenic spot.
• The Bali pineapple that makes up more than three-quarters of local plantings, with the bulk of the crop coming in during April and May.
• The Quaternary volcanic eruption and collapse relics at Tianyang in the same township, which the county lists among its natural features.

Location & getting there

Getting to Pineapple Sea

Check the open visitor route and follow the site’s rules on distance, food and photography. Conservation areas may limit access beyond designated paths.

• Search for 菠萝的海 with 湛江市 and 徐闻县.