In Guizhou there are numerous places where you can spend some time learning about the ethnic minorities of the province or exploring some spectacular and less known spots.
I am interested to visit the tallest waterfalls, in China, and I am heading to Chishui, which is in the northern part of the province of Guizhou bordering Sichuan province.
To travel from Guiyang to Chishui took about 5 hours, the bus I got was one of my favourite, old with shaky seats and a bit dirty. In China, nowadays, everything is new, it is a country that has got a dramatic change in the last twenty years or so and, if from one side can be good and comfortable from the other it loses all the characteristic and true feel that someone has when travelling in Asia.I love, in particular, the southwest part of China , full of green hills, mountains, marvelous sceneries and above all generous and welcoming people.
The travel to Chishui, it is already a big trip in itself, a bit for the lovely landscapes accompanying you along the way, where the road disappears into the thick vegetation and endless hills and also
for the friendly Chinese people that are very chatty and always try to strike up a conversation with you.It is never boring to travel long distances in China, there is always a way to keep yourself entertained.
I arrived by night in Chishui and, as I got off the bus, I started to look for an accommodation in the vicinity. I found a cheap hotel next to the bus station, a room was eighty yuan per night facing the chishui river. The accommodations, here, are fairly cheap, spacious, comfortable and clean.
The city itself is not very attracting and it is becoming more and more touristic, lines of hotels and construction sites appear one after the other.
The reason why I came here is to admire the gorgeous natural wonders scattered around the area.
Even with a bit of rain, the place looked really cool, the trail was paved, the first stretch of the track run along the Chishui river, a sea of bamboo I could see along the way, beautiful ferns and gentle waterways . Further ahead there was a sort of playground, spoiling the beautiful scenery around me, a n eight meters tall waterfall gushing down a small pool, gave back, again, the natural ambiance of the place.
After the first and easy stretch of the trail, the rest was just climbing up to the summit. As I climbed up, the drizzle begun to be thicker, the water running down from the upper rocks made the path slightly slippery and this caused me to be more cautious about the conditions of the trail, but, as I got closer to the mountain summit, I was rewarded with fantastic views of all the waterways that made their way down to the bottom of the pool.
I could see that some path were closed due to the heavy rainfall and, for security reasons, it was not possible to go
Once I reached the summit, I saw a few farmers working the land, there were rice and corn fields, orchards, baskets full of colourful fruits and vegetables, it was really gorgeous. The vistas were tremendous, the rain, thanks to god, has stopped for a while allowing me a few minutes to take a nice look at such a beautiful place and to breath in some fresh mountain air. The mist added that sort of spooky ambiance to the place, far in the distance I could see some houses almost hidden by the lush forest that reminded me of a place in Latin America. This was that kind of place where I wished I had my tent with me to pitch somewhere, it was so peaceful and inspiring that I fell immediately in love with that. Some little sheds had piles of bamboo
canes in it, many birds were twittering and jumping on the crop, numerous were also the butterflies, some of them had wings resembling like a leaf, the nature is really incredible.On my way back to the bust stop there were some local stores selling food and souvenirs, I just stopped for a lunch while I was waiting for the bus to go back to Chishui.
I heard that, in this area, there are over 400 cascades and I went to visit the second tallest waterfall in China known as (shizhangdongpubu). From downtown Chishui the bus cost about 12 yuan and it takes
one hour or so to arrive at the national park. As it happens in most natural scenic areas, in China, the entrance to the national park is a bit expensive. To get to the great fall you can pay an extra twenty yuan to have a shuttle bus driving you up to the fall or walking all the way up to the cascade. I opted to have a nice walk in the forest instead of walking on the asphalt with many cars running next to you. As I left the entrance gate I could see already a few small waterfalls and looking up there were many streams running down from the cliff, it was truly gorgeous. While walking, I spotted a trail with clear signs forbidding the tourists to go beyond that, but I ignored the sign and I jumped over the fence keeping walking through the forest. This path was just perched on the rock wall, it was the perfect one to explore the nature closely, a thundering river was only a few meters away, red coloured water made its course down the valley treacherously, it was marvelous to stare at the sheer power of the nature.The sound of the water was deafening, I could not do without staying for a moment admiring such a beautiful spectacle, but soon after I discovered why the trail was closed and it was because at a certain point a bridge collapsed and I had to go all the way back on the road.
After, probably, two hours walk I met the first big waterfall named "Beauty Comb Waterfall" measuring 18.5 meters in height and 76.6 meters in width. The thundering boom of the fall could be heard miles away, another excellent spot.
"The red army of Chairman Mao passed from here in the "Long March" in October 1934.
Slowly, I was arriving at the biggest fall, I could see the vapour well before arriving at the area of the great fall. The sound of the splashing water became louder and louder but that one was not the closest platform, there was another one just a few meters away from the fall but that day it was closed for safety reasons. Even from a big distance, the fall was just awesome, this fall is only a couple of meters shorter than the biggest in
Anshui, within the same province. 76 meters in height and 80 meters in width. It, then, began to rain pretty heavily and I decided to walk back on the road and went to have some food to eat. This place was also very beautiful and I enjoyed my trek in the national park, but, as it happened in the previous one, the path was too much short, also because some other tracks were not accessible.Definitely, it is a place to visit with its numerous and beautiful thundering cascades and waterways.
Before going back to downtown, I stopped to have a look at the ancient city of Bingan, but I have to admit that I was quite disappointed by that place, the ancient towns, now, are just shops filled in with many kind of souvenirs and things of this kind, but that have nothing left of their ancient ambiance.
Only some stilted houses are still standing overlooking the Chishui river, but, all in all, I think it is certainly not a place worth for a visit, in my opinion.
My time in this beautiful area has ended and I have to leave,
but I think that spending even two weeks, here, would have not bothered me, since that with its more than 400 falls and rural areas there is a lot to see in this place.
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RENanDREW
Ren & Andrew
Beautiful
Marcos your blogs are a great guide to the lesser known places in this part of China! It's so nice to read about places I've never heard of, and to get such an intimate view into their everyday lives. Looking forward to reading more :)