CHONGQING - If other major cities in China are undergoing face-lifts, Chongqing is having radical reconstructive surgery: In 1997, it became the fourth city to achieve the status of municipality (after Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai). With summers so hot it's been dubbed one of China's Three Furnaces, and streets so steep that no one rides a bike, terrain and weather were once its chief claims to fame. Now, this cliffside city overlooking the confluence of the Cháng and Jialíng rivers has much to boast about. Chongqing is the biggest metropolitan area in the world (surpassing Tokyo); it's got the world's biggest dam site down river; it's in the midst of building the world's tallest skyscraper (the Chongqing Tower); and a 17 station monorail system will be up and running in 2005 (not a record breaker, but no mean feat).

As recently as the 19th century, Chongqing was a remote walled city. Even after the steam engine eased passage through the Three Gorges, few Easterners had any reason or desire to make the trip. That all changed in 1938, when Hànkou fell to the Japanese and down river residents made a mass exodus up the Cháng Jiang (Yángzi River). Chongqing became China's last wartime capital, and after withstanding 3 years of Japanese bombing, the city never looked back.

Very few of the old ramshackle neighborhoods rebuilt after the war have survived "urban improvement," and except for an old prison complex and a few small museums and memorials there is little evidence of earlier eras. Most travelers come to Chongqing because it's the first or last stop on a Three Gorges cruise. Chongqìngs pleasures are modest, but there's enough here to make a 2 or 3 day stay enjoyable. The city is also just a 2-hour bus ride from the Buddhist Grottoes at Dazu.