China Guide
Fujian, Guangdong and Hainan Island
Yongding
The otherwise unremarkable town of YONGDING is a useful transport interchange for the Hakka roundhouse villages of Zencheng Lou and beyond. If you can't find direct transport from coastal Fujian, aim first for Longyan, a small city 170km northwest of Xiamen, where roads and separate rail lines from Fuzhou, Quanzhou and Xiamen converge. Frequent minibuses depart Longyan's long-distance bus station for Yongding (1hr).
Set on the edge of a flat river basin, Yongding is an old town, today recast as a heavily built-up, typically ugly place, whose residents are nevertheless very friendly towards the few foreigners who make it up here.
The road from Longyan ends up at a roundabout, where you'll find the bus station and decent, if forgettable and slightly noisy, accommodation options. The best of these is the DongfuJiudian ( 
0957/5830668; Price: ¥80-139), which has clean, pleasant rooms and helpful staff; the nearby Jiari Lüguan (Price: ¥50-79) and Tianhe Lüguan ( 0597/5835769; Price: ¥50-79) aren't quite as comfortable.
Yongding runs frequent buses to Zhencheng and its Hakka roundhouses (1hr) as well as services to Meizhou in Guangdong, and Xiamen.