Anhui, part 9: Down Huangshan

I wonder how recently that platform was the trail through this section... A little worse for wear now. Luckily we had a concrete trail to walk upon.

We caught sight of the Jade Screen cable car, but instead of being able to go down to it, we had to go up and around.


Hurry hurry hurry. We still need to see the Welcoming Tree before we leave!



We skipped the shortcut down to the cable car station so we could head over to the Jade Screen Hotel area.


Lots of (apparently) famous sayings were carved into the cliff.


Lots of (apparently) happy people milled about.

Nearby is the Welcoming Pine. Just another tree, if you ask me, but it's hard to get to and/or take a photo of, so everyone clambers to get to it and take a photo.

A few raindrops fell from the sky, but not enough to get the umbrella hawkers excited.

We doubled back toward Lotus Peak on a lower trail, the cable car in sight again.


We paused for a rest at the junction with the trail that goes up toward Lotus Peak and avoids the Jade Screen Hotel and Welcoming Pine. 'Twas limited traffic on that route, so the stairs made for good seating.


Finally, we got to the cable car station. Wait in line.


Down down down into the forest.



We disembarked at Mercy Light Station, a short walk from Mercy Light Temple. We had a timetable to keep, so we couldn't stop. We needed to get to our bus.


Our bus wasn't waiting there, though. Another 1200 meters, but what was that to us, after all the walking that day? We'd only be a little later than expected.

All steps, down down down.

Still with some from our tour group. I couldn't walk as slow as them on the stairs, so I spent a lot of time looking back up...

We passed Ren-Shaped Falls, which looked a bit dry and missing one leg.

"Ren" is the Chinese character for "person," which looks a lot like an inverted V or a capital lambda. I think this is just the left branch of it.





Down down down the stairs. Keep walking. We arrived at the hot springs area, which has several hotels and more under construction. 550 mL of water for sale for 3 yuan, then 2 yuan. The 10-yuan bottle from Lotus Pavilion was long gone. Hot hiking, even downhill.

Finally on the bus. Cool a/c breeze on my face. Ahhhhh...

What a hike!

More photos on flickr.