Huangshan, China - Yellow Mountain (黄山)

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The famous scrolls of chinese black and white paintings of high mountains, rocks, trees and sea of clouds come alive in huangshan mountains in the south anhui province. It is a marvelous mountain area, now on the UNESCO World cultural and natural heritage list. there is an old saying well known throughout the country “no need to see any other mountains after huangshan!”

Huangshan has spectacular landscape with its four unique scenes: interesting shaped rocks, waterfalls, unique shaped pine trees growing out of rocks, and its sea of clouds. huangshan has it all, the steepness, the grace, the elegance, and so on.

There a specific Chinese saying which goes “五岳归来不看山，黄山归来不看岳”. It means basically there are 5 top famous mountains in China. There is no other need to view the other mountains in China if one has seen these top 5. However, if one has been to Huangshan, there is no other need to see any other mountain within China! Huangshan or Yellow Mountain as it is renowned as the number one mountain in China and for accorded with this title is not without a reason.

We arrived late morning in September and the temperature was cooling. From the foot of the yellow mountain we took the cable car service that runs up all the way to the mountain top. The ride took about 20 minutes there or so. It was another 10 minutes way to the lodging area which is as good as a 2-stars hotel in China! Not that spectacular that one would expect but for one that is way up the famous mountain, this is rather acceptable. It comes with all necessary facilities with breakfast.

From the hotel, it takes probably a stone throw for one to view the magnificient and spectacular scenery on top Yellow Mountain. There are various routes that will bring one to an area of specific viewing spot. Each routes take different time and ennergy level as the cemented steps go up and down each routes, with some very tiny routes of about a person's shouldner width without any hand-rails! Not for the faint hearted at some route crossings. However, they are plans to fence up these routes that all young and old will be able to travel and enjoy the beautiful scenery up in Yellow Mountain.

The time taken to cover each specific routes depends on individual as well as the distance. The longest and most challenging route to the very top of the peak takes probably about an hours for an average person. Our fittest youngster covered it in 30 minutes one way! For the seniors, there are the carriage services which charges a rate of about 150 Chinese Yuan to shuffle from one point to another one way.



There is also a massaging service back in every hotel located at the mountain and it's worth the money to get relaxed for the expert hands to sooth your aching muscles after a day's hardwork on top of the world at Yellow Mountain!

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Comments

[Chris and Nikki]

Beautiful picture.