Can you drive up Moganshan? Between 08:00 and 17:30, no. Your car stops at a transfer centre at the foot of the mountain and you go on by shuttle. The Moganshan private car ban has been in force since 30 November 2018. No English guide we could find explains it, so most foreign visitors meet it at a barrier on a bend.
| Question | Answer, as of December 2025 |
|---|---|
| Can a private car drive into the scenic area 08:00 to 17:30 | No |
| Before 08:00 or after 17:30 | Yes, no permit needed |
| The exception during the day | A confirmed booking at a property inside the gate, plus a parking reservation made through it |
| Where the car stops otherwise | Yucun, Fatou or Houwu transfer centre |
The mountain is Moganshan (莫干山), in Deqing County (德清县), Huzhou (湖州), Zhejiang Province (浙江省), about 60 km north of Hangzhou and 200 to 240 km from Shanghai. Moganshan Road in Shanghai, home of the M50 art district, is a street 200 km away with no barrier and no shuttle.
What the rule actually says
The wording, as the provincial outlet Tide News (潮新闻) printed it in December 2025, is short. From 30 November 2018, between 08:00 and 17:30, vehicles entering the Moganshan scenic area must change onto scenic area buses at a transfer station (换乘站). The reason, a staff member told the same reporters, is flat ground: the mountain has little of it for car parks, and the buses need room to turn.
Vehicle transfer rule, 08:00 to 17:30 daily, in force since 30 November 2018, and the staff explanation, Tide News (潮新闻), 4 December 2025, tier 2. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3315585
Two things follow. It applies to the scenic area (风景名胜区), the protected core, not to the villages below it, where most of the guesthouses are. And it is enforced on the road, well below the ticket gate, by staff with a sign that says turn around.
The exception: a bed inside the gate and a parking reservation
Here is the part that trips people up, because it looks like a sales trick. It is the rule. A guest with a confirmed booking at a minsu (民宿, a guesthouse) or hotel inside the scenic area may drive in at any time of day, on two conditions: the booking itself, and a parking reservation (停车预约) made in advance. Staff put it down to geography: the properties inside the gate are scattered, some far from any shuttle stop, and guests arrive with luggage.
Guests holding an in park accommodation booking and a parking reservation may drive in at any time, Tide News (潮新闻), 4 December 2025, tier 2. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3315585
The reports don’t say how the reservation is made. Every Chinese account we read has the guesthouse handling it: you book, you send the owner your number plate, the owner registers the car. No public booking page or official channel name could be confirmed, so ask the property in writing. Forum posts mention a per car charge on entry. We could not source that figure at any tier, so it is not printed here.
What happened in December 2025
The rule made the news because a visitor called Zhou Jia drove up for the autumn colour on 1 December 2025 and was stopped on a switchback short of the Sword Pond (剑池) area. Told she needed a guesthouse booking and a parking reservation to continue, she called it tied selling. The story ran.
Two days later Tide News reporters drove the same road. Near the Linhai Pavilion (林海亭), still 5.8 km from the entrance, staff stopped them too, with the same message.
Reporters stopped near the Linhai Pavilion, 5.8 km from the entrance, on 3 December 2025, Tide News (潮新闻), 4 December 2025, tier 2. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3315585
The signs were there, telling vehicles bound for the scenic area to turn round and change at Houwu. They are in Chinese, which is why the rule is news to foreign drivers and not to locals.
Where the car stops
There are three transfer points, one for each approach. The main one, the Moganshan tourist transfer centre (莫干山旅游集散换乘中心), is in Yucun (庾村) at the foot of the mountain. The other two are at Fatou (筏头) on the provincial road S304 and at Houwu (后坞).
| Transfer point | Where | Route up, as reported in 2019 |
|---|---|---|
| Moganshan tourist transfer centre | Yucun, off Huangfu East Road | The back of the mountain, to Yinshan Street |
| Fatou transfer centre | Fatou, on the S304 | The front of the mountain, via Houwu, to Huating |
| Houwu transfer point | Houwu village, off the S304 | Joins the Fatou route |
Three transfer points, their locations and routes, Sohu Travel (搜狐旅游, 权哥探店), 2 July 2019, tier 3. https://www.sohu.com/a/324235488_357973
The Yucun centre opened with the rule, with 500 parking spaces and a shuttle at RMB 35 return or RMB 18 single down, the county’s tourism account said in December 2018. Whether that launch fare still holds is for a separate piece on the shuttle system; until then the getting around page has the board.
Transfer centre opened with 500 parking spaces and a RMB 35 return shuttle fare, as announced by Deqing Culture and Tourism (德清文旅), 7 December 2018, tier 4, reproduced on 163.com. https://m.163.com/dy/article/E2EU8TUV0518SHA7.html
Parking at the two main centres is charged by the hour. The only tariff in print is a 2019 travel report, repeated unchanged in a September 2025 forum answer. No county price notice could be reached from outside China, so this is what has been reported, not what has been confirmed.
| Time parked | Charge, reported |
|---|---|
| Up to 30 minutes | Free |
| 30 minutes to 5 hours | RMB 10 |
| 5 to 10 hours | RMB 15 |
| 10 to 15 hours | RMB 20 |
| Over 15 hours | RMB 25 |
Parking tariff at the Yucun and Fatou transfer points, and free parking at Houwu, Sohu Travel (搜狐旅游), 2 July 2019, tier 3, repeated by Autohome (汽车之家), 22 September 2025, tier 3. https://www.sohu.com/a/324235488_357973
Before 08:00, after 17:30, and the quiet weekday
The rule has edges, and the edges are useful. Before 08:00 and after 17:30 the road is open to anyone, no booking, no reservation. Leave Hangzhou at 06:30 and you are up before the barrier. The catch is that the ticketed sights keep their own hours, so an early car buys a walk, not the Sword Pond.
A softer edge exists too. Staff told Tide News that on quiet weekdays the cut off for driving in can be relaxed to 15:00, while weekends and holidays run the full 08:00 to 17:30. That is discretion, not policy. Don’t plan around it. The news page carries each Golden Week programme when it drops.
Weekday relaxation to 15:00 at staff discretion; weekends and holidays strictly 08:00 to 17:30, Tide News (潮新闻), 4 December 2025, tier 2. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3315585
The hours that disagree
Three sets of times circulate and they are not the same thing.
| What | Hours | Source and date |
|---|---|---|
| The car ban | 08:00 to 17:30 | Tide News, December 2025 |
| The shuttle at Houwu | 08:30 to 17:00, last up 16:30, last down 17:00 | Tide News, December 2025 |
| The car ban, one forum answer | 07:00 to 17:00 | Autohome, September 2025 |
| The transfer centres, our own check | 08:00 to 18:00 | BeyondBorder Group Ltd desk research, August 2026 |
Shuttle hours at Houwu, departing when full or every 30 minutes, Tide News (潮新闻), 4 December 2025, tier 2, and the 07:00 to 17:00 forum answer, Autohome (汽车之家), 22 September 2025, tier 3. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3315585 https://www.autohome.com.cn/ask/18981801.html
The 08:00 to 17:30 window was printed by a newsroom that had just been stopped on the road, so it is the one this page uses. The shuttle window inside it decides your day: a last bus down at 17:00 puts a day tripper off the mountain before the road reopens to cars. The 18:00 figure on our own getting around page came from a desk check of listings and will be reconciled when the shuttle piece runs. Nobody here has walked the road or rung the ticket line, 0572 8412345, which answers in Chinese.
Who should drive, and where they should sleep
For a first visit staying in a village, leave the car. The train to Deqing station and a taxi or guesthouse pickup covers the last leg. Inside the scenic area a car earns nothing. A day trip by car does not add up either. The tickets and entry page has the hours inside the gate, and the planning FAQ covers what follows.
A car pays in three cases. You are staying inside the gate and the property will register the plate. You are moving between outlying villages over several days, a road job the villages page explains. Or someone in the party cannot manage the shuttle and the walk at the top, in which case a bed inside the gate is the answer and the car follows.
One question decides it: is the property inside the scenic area boundary or outside it? Inside means the old hill station, the few hotels at the top and a small number of minsu on the upper slopes. Outside means Yucun, Xiantan, Laoling, Houwu and the rest, where most foreign visitors sleep. Listings rarely say which. Ask the property whether it can register a car for daytime entry. A yes settles it. A vague answer means outside. Where to stay sorts the properties by type, and the hotels explained page covers the named hotels.
Last checked 7 September 2026 by Cyril Drouin. Prices, timetables and entry rules on this mountain move without notice, so confirm anything you are booking around.
Photographs on this site are representative illustrations, not documentary images of the specific building, property or service described.
