Journey to Western Hunan - Zhangjiajie

This autumn, I took advantage of the opportunity to go home to visit relatives and take a trip to western Hunan.

After entering Hunan, go directly through Yueyang, Yiyang and Changde and enter the Zhangjiajie area. After passing Changde, I began to feel the obvious changes in the environment. As we walk deeper and deeper, the mountains get higher and denser, with mountains and hills, fields and houses dotted among the green mountains and green waters, creating an idyllic scenery, and the flavor of "Peach Blossom Land" gradually becomes stronger.

 

The word Wuling comes from the name of the Wuling Mountains that meanders on the borders of Hunan, Hubei, Chongqing and Guizhou provinces. The Wuling Mountains run through the four provinces and cities of Hunan, Hubei, Chongqing, and Guizhou. It is a majestic and tall mountain range in the south, covering the vast areas of Enshi in southwest Hubei, southeast of Chongqing, and western Hunan. The local indigenous people are mostly Miao and Tujia.

Greater Xiangxi (Western Hunan region) is generally a collective name that includes Zhangjiajie City, Xiangxi Autonomous Prefecture, Huaihua City, and Shaoyang western counties (Suining, etc.). The famous Greater The mountain has two major water systems: Wuling, Xuefeng, and Yuanshui and Lishui. Xiangxi is located at the junction of four provinces. As you can imagine, it is quite remote and has very special geographical conditions. I remember that in the past, traveling mainly relied on travel agency buses. We spent a lot of time on the road between tourist attractions. Nowadays, the highways are relatively developed, and the high-speed railway will be opened to traffic by the end of the year, making transportation much more convenient and faster.

 

Tianzi Mountain

When the car approached Tianzi Mountain, a section of the highway was still under repair, so we had to take a short detour on a county road and pass through the villages at the foot of the mountain. The roads are narrow and bumpy, and it is easy to get stuck in traffic jams. I deeply feel the inconvenience for people here in the past.

 

It was nearly five o'clock in the afternoon, the sun was setting in the west, and the smoke was curling up. Finally, we arrived at Tianzishan Town at the foot of Tianzi Mountain and stayed at a nice B&B by the river.

 

Across the river is the boundary of Tianzi Mountain Scenic Area. Close to the scenic area, many new houses are being built, mostly in Tujia style.

The river is wide and deep, but strangely, there is no water. This was beyond our expectations. When I came back in the evening and chatted with the shop owner, I realized that in the past two years, a lot of civil engineering projects had been started, and the construction water was intercepted. The increasing number of human activities makes people worry about the future impact on the environment.

Most of the homes in the mountains use local materials, such as bamboo and wood, to return to nature and relax the body and mind.

After settling down, we went to the town not far away to look for food. The town is very peaceful and peaceful. Local food is mainly Tujia style, but for the convenience of tourists, stores generally also provide food commonly eaten in the north and south. The convenience of life, accommodation, and communication are not much different from those in the mainland. However, as a reminder, you still need to be cautious when eating local sausages and other local products.

Early the next morning, we entered the Tianzi Mountain Scenic Area. Marshal He Long is from Xiangxi, and his hometown is Sangzhi County where this place belongs. The statue looks quite high-quality and feels very friendly.

The Zhangjiajie Scenic Area is very, very large, covering hundreds of square kilometers, and several gates are far apart. Large tickets require fingerprint registration and are valid for a few days.

This time we entered through the gate of Tianzi Mountain and spent a day exploring the three major areas including Tianzi Mountain, Yangjiajie and Yuanjiajie. There are environmentally friendly transportation vehicles in the scenic area. In that special geographical environment, it feels very necessary and relatively safer.

Tianzi Mountain has various landform types, the typical and iconic one is the quartz sandstone peak forest landform. It feels like something from an alien planet. No wonder the movie "Avatar" was filmed here. Because there was some fog, the photo effects were not ideal.

Yangjiajie Scenic Area is located on the outskirts of the city. Mountain Suppressing Bandits The place of square, The village is The village is built of stone walls, with almost no flat ground. "After a circle, I found that some places were stone walls with narrow gaps in the sky, and some places were man-made iron poles, which tested my physical strength and concentration. I didn't go to all of them, and only experienced a few dozen meters. Can by imagine exist this Local life of difficult . then The anti-bandit battles carried out here It's really too "south" too "south" Be .

 

The latest to be developed is the central scenic spot - Yuanjiajie. The scenery includes the place where "Avatar" was filmed, Optimus Prime and the giant natural stone arch bridge, which are amazing. The individual landscapes are large in scale and close together, making them difficult to photograph well. I’ll leave it to you to see for yourself.

Wulingyuan

In order to and then go to Fenghuang, I drove dozens of kilometers at around 4 o'clock in the afternoon and stayed in Suoxiyu Town, which is relatively close to the gate of Wulingyuan.

The roads connecting the entrances of several major scenic spots are newly built high-grade highways, which are very pleasant.

Suoxiyu Town belongs to Cili County. It is noisier and busier than expected, but it also provides a lot of conveniences in life.

Reminiscent of Enshi City in Hubei Province that I passed by before, it also felt like it was noisy from morning to night. The restless and turbulent temperament of the border town is a bit in contrast to people's imagination , but it also seems to contain a kind of primitive vitality under hardship.

On the third day, we entered Wulingyuan Scenic Area early in the morning, the iconic gate. The overall feel of this landscape is rather traditional.

 

Visited Shili Gallery and took the Hundred Dragons Ladder. Seeing that the amount of water in the scenic spot is not large, and the time is tight, I passed by Golden Whip Creek and did not go in.

 

Zhangjiajie is the country’s earliest national forest park. "My Motherland and Me" was sung across the country during the National Day. The lyricist Zhang Li got inspiration from Zhangjiajie. It is a very special place where mountains, rivers and humanities complement each other.

 

This beautiful and vast land can only be visited in a day or two. The famous Huangshi Village was perfectly bypassed by this time. Save that for next time.