I lived in Hangzhou for about six months, it’s nice, a manageable size, and kind of pretty. Like most Chinese cities, dust, pollution, and everything is covered with concrete, but it’s relatively pretty for all that, especially around the mountain and lake.

I personally prefer the small towns north of Dali in Yunnan, or Kunming, Nanjing, Sichuan, for friendly-ish backpacker vibes.

Dali itself is cool, but more interesting are the areas around it and in the mountains.

I personally like China as a former backpacker, I loved traveling around and the rawness of some areas juxtaposed against the slapdash construction (though china goes out of its way to “develop” anything remotely marketable as a tourist destination, so all the beautiful places have scars).