Chilling Out On Mount Huangshan (黄山)
Posted On Monday, November 2, 2009 at at 12:59 AM by Alvin
Autumn travelling in China could be fun, if you like bumping into sudden cold weather fronts ! Temperatures dropped to the single digits as we entered one of the most scenic of all mountain ranges in China - Huangshan (黄山). We spent one night at the outlying city of Tunxi (屯溪) where there were characteristic buildings (徽派建築) aplenty of the Province of Auhui (安徽省). We strolled along the famous Old Street (老街) that was full of tea shops, the ever-present souvenir stalls as well as shops selling water color paintings (山水畫) of Huangshan; the Old Street had a rather relaxing feel to it and we enjoyed our excellent dinner before our climb on Huangshan in the coming days. We then spent 2 days at the foot of Huangshan, yes, two duvets required for these nights with sub-zero temperatures and the hotel was even kind enough to lend us a lamp heater for our room ! We strolled along the hot spring (温泉) areas on the first day followed by our ascent to the top of Huangshan on the following day. We were greeted by Huangshan with a blue blue clear Autumn day during our climb and we witnessed the spectacular sea of clouds (雲海) in the early morning (this was around 9AM) and of course the ever present Huangshan Pine trees (黄山奇松).The Huangshan Pine (黄山松) had been a subject of prime research interest as these trees release a particular type of organic acid that facilitate their firm-rooting into the rocks of Huangshan and could thus live to hundreds of years amid the harsh mountain conditions. We witnessed numerous odd-shaped rocks (怪石) during our hike on the top of Huangshan; the best of all without doubt, had been the "Stone That Flew Here" (飛來石 - picture on the top) where we spent half an hour just admiring this sheer stunning vista.
The hot springs(温泉), sea of clouds (雲海) , Huangshan Pine trees (奇松) and odd-shaped rocks (怪石) had been known as the four attractions of Huangshan (黃山四絕). We thoroughly enjoyed our walk on the top of Huangshan where we visited the famous land marks of 始信峰, 排雲亭, 光明頂, 鰲魚峰, 蓮花峰, 玉屏樓, 天都峰, 一線天 and 慈光閣. We spent 2 hours on our way down to 慈光閣 and enjoyed our dinner at one of the two opening restaurants (low season) chatting over our fun day !
