Some six hours by bus from Nanjing is a mountainous area known as the Yellow Mountain, HuangShan. It is said that once you have seen this area, you no longer need to see a mountain. If this is an excuse not to visit mountains, so be it. They are certainly such that one could feel that one has indeed seen the stereotypical specimen.
Above; the ‘Western Sea’, showing the collections of ridges. Below, what passes for a map of the area.
We did the lengthy bus ride and stayed in a hotel in the town closest to the park area – think National Park and you will be close enough to understanding. These are the ‘seas’, so called because they fill with cloud.
I could write a lot more, but the pictures say as much with less effort on your part.
My copy of the shot does not do justice to the tree, so I deleted it and instead I have added a classic view from the internet at the foot of this (and taken on a better day) to persuade you that you have seen it before.
I am afraid my reaction to these paths was inappropriate: I felt Fred Quimby had persuaded the cartoonist that does Wily Coyote and Road Runner to draw the path onto the mountain – and lo, there it is. One could describe this as one face of communism: if you can go into the mountains, then we must all be able so to do – and so the path is necessary. Given the ‘famous’ nature of the mountains here, one can see why. . Undisputedly, without the paths, the numbers would be very few and the access much more difficult too.
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Left: narrow steep descent, preceded by she who is now the lady wife. Right: the summit of one of the two highest peaks. The are open alternately, so you cannot do them both in the same day. I think they are open in turn for most of a year. I was so very comfortable on this narrow ridge I had by hands in my pockets. Can’t imagine why.
This is, I think one of the most photographed trees in the world.
