Longmen Grottos enjoys a long-standing history and a far and wide reputation in the world. Today, it has become a popular tourist destination which attracts millions of people every year.

Long-standing History of Longmen Grottoes

Enjoying a history of thousand years, Longmen Grottoes has long been hailed as the Four Great Grottoes in China. The construction of Longmen Grottoes started in 493. The grottoes were built upon the Longmen Mountain which was believed to be a holy spot for the grottoes according to Chinese Fengshui theory. It took hundreds of years to complete the whole grotto group which stretches thousands of meters upon the mountain. The majority of the Longmen Grottoes is believed to be carved during Tang Dynasty with only a minority of them being carved during North Wei Dynasty. Due to this reason, the grottoes are quite different in the styles of the Buddhist statues. The parts which were carved during North Wei look slim and neat, while rest of the grottoes carved in Tang dynasty are plumper. The difference has its historical roots. Tang Dynasty is the most prosperous dynasty in culture, economy and politic in Chinese history, therefore everything appeared in Tang Dynasty looks kind of larger in sizes and shapes.

Features of Longmen Grotos

In addition, Longmen Grottoes is also a treasure house of Chinese calligraphy. There are a large number of inscriptions found in Longmen Grottoes. The inscriptions show the reason why the grottoes were carved. Nowadays, these inscriptions play a key role in studying the cultures of Tang Dynasty and the calligraphy. More importantly, Longmen Grottoes also houses a large number of antiques ranging from politics, economy, culture, to religion, arts, architecture, calligraphy, as well as music, medicine, costume, etc. Therefore Longmen Grottoes is regarded as a treasure house and a museum. Up to this day, over 2000 cave shrines, over 2860 pieces of inscriptions, over 70 Buddhist pagodas and more than 100,000 statues of Buddhas are found in Longmen Grottoes. These historical and cultural treasures earned Longmen Grottoes one of the richest Buddhism treasure houses in China. On November 30 of 2000, Longmen Grottoes was included into the World Cultural Heritage list by the UNESCO.

All in all, Longmen grottoes are truly worthwhile seeing with its rich collection of historical and cultural relics and a visit to Longmen Grottoes will give you an insight into the essence of Buddhism culture.

Glimpse top Yangtze River attractions like the Three Gorges, Fengdu Ghost City, Three Gorges Dam, Shennong Stream etc and discover lots of stunning natural sceneries that you never imagine only from your ship cabin. Before join Yangtze River Cruise, here we want to tell you one attraction worth it to visit for a shore excursion, Shibaozhai.

Overview about Shibaozhai

Shibaozhai which means Stone Treasure Fortress is a hill along the bank of the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang). It was first built in Qing Dynasty in 1750, with a height of 56 meters. Shibaozhai is simply a rectangular rock with sheer cliffs, standing on the riverside. A red wooden pagoda which is 12 stories high was built against the rock wall. Built on the northern bank of the Yangtze River of China, about 278kms away from Chongqing, Shibaozhai is one of the highlights in Yangtze River cruise.

At the top of Shibaozhai is a three-storied hall dedicated to Manjusri built during the reign of the Xianfeng Emperor (1850–1861), called the Purple Rain Pavilion. In 1819, the nine-story pavilion was constructed adjacent to the cliff to aid people in getting to the top of the hill.

What to Do in Shibaozhai?

Visitors can climb to the top by spiral staircase inside the pagoda. When getting to the top, people can gain a panoramic view of the winding river, the village and the countryside. On the way to the top, visitors are also could see every floor of the wooden structure contains with interesting and authentic artifacts.

If you have a shore excursion to Shibaozhai on your Yangtze River cruise then you can see lots of fruit and souvenirs sellers along the way to the pagoda. Lots of Chinese traditional food and souvenirs you can buy, but of course you should bargain it first. If you need it, you can ask your guide to help you get a good price for them.

How to Get There:
1. Take a bus from Jiaotong Square of Chaotianmen to Zhong County, and it takes about 2 hours. And then take a bus at Zhong County Station to Shibaozhai.
2. Take a yacht from Chaotian Harbor to Zhong County, and it takes about 3 hours. And then take a bus at Zhong County Station to Shibaozhai. Buses in Zhong County to Shibaiozhai run about every 30 minutes.

Starting from the southern slope of Shennongjia, which is hailed as "the No.1 peak in Central China", Shennong Stream flows among remote mountains throughout the year and meets the Yangtze River at the southern end of Longchang Gorge. Meandering for 60 km, the stream is accompanied by layers of peaks and knolls, which create the Shennong Gorge, Parrot Gorge and Longchang Gorge, which are all very peculiar, exquisite and precipitous. Along the stream are dotted with various cultural landscapes such as ancient hanging coffins, plank roads built along the cliff, primitive small boats and the customs of Tujia ethnic minority.

Biological Resource along Shennong Stream
Yangtze Cruise along Shennong Stream

Situated in the subtropical zone with a monsoon climate, Shennong Stream features varied climates subject to the change of elevation, with the temperature ranking from -21 to 38.5 degree Celsius in different seasons. The variety of the climate makes it a natural gallery with rich biological resources. In the primeval forest at the headstream of Shennong Stream, there still live many rare animals like white snakes and white snub-nosed monkeys. Among all plants, Davidia or dove trees are most arresting. According to interrelated data, this kind of trees died out in most places on the earth after the Ice Age.

Boat Tracker Culture along Shennong Stream
Boat Tracker along Shennong Stream

Boat Tracker Culture refers to the old tradition in the Three Gorges area that trackers tow a boat in the water by holding the towropes on their shoulders. Today, this tradition has almost been extinct, but that in Shennong Stream is still persisted and becomes a living fossil of the local boat tracker culture.

Ancient Ba Culture along Shennong Stream
Ba People is not one of the 56 ethnic groups of China but an ancient tribe moved to this area in ancient China. The ancient Ba people settled down here and created the astonishing ancient plank roads on cliff and hanging coffins by hands. Today, their offspring still live by Shennong Stream and is known to the outside world as Tujia ethnic minority. Inheriting their forefathers’ characters of being frank and good at singing and dancing, Tujia people still keep that prevail until today. Crying singing on wedding is another unique folk custom of Tujia people to show brides’ sorrow at leaving their own parents and family. It was seen as a skill and a girl who could sing a touching crying song was considered to be a good bride.