Guo’s Villa is one of those places you wish were a secret. On a slightly off-colour day, the weather I mean, there are few people there and sitting right on the bank of West Lake drinking green tea with a book or friend is one of those unique-to-Hangzhou ways of whiling away an afternoon.

Whoever Mr. Guo Shilin was, he must have had some cash and guanxi. His house was built in 1851 and to have the pull to get a spot right on West Lake he would have pulled some strings. Big strings. The house has smallish living quarters and large gardens stretching in all maybe 100 metres along the lake. The style is very much East China garden, with rockeries, ponds stacked with Koi, windows that somehow look like mirrors – except you are not in the reflection, solitude, and views, some manicured, some natural. Guo’s place faces absolutely east, so the morning sun rising must have been spectacular. From his err breakfast terrace Guo would have seen the whole of Sudi Causeway, an expanse of water and felt a cool breeze.

These days Guo’s Villa is a part of the extensive garden parks of Hangzhou that surround much of the Lake. Of course Sudi is still there, and in the hazy distance Hangzhou is shimmering.