The Shanghai North Bund's storied history has entered a new chapter with the development of a 'cruise city' for leisure travelers, Yang Feiyue reports. 

A historical port has become a modern attraction in Shanghai. Some older residents still call the Beiwaitan, or Shanghai North Bund, by its old name, Gaoyanglu wharf.

The North Bund hosted some of China's earliest wharfs, starting from the 1800s. Political figures, such as former premier Zhou Enlai, and overseas students departed from here to such foreign lands as Japan and Europe.

The North Bund's wharfs along the Huangpu River, an estuary of the Yangtze, have remained important to Shanghai's shipping industry, especially exports, over the past 170 years.