Mistaken identity rocks & Hiking Chinese style

Last weekend I finally made it to Huang Shan, otherwise known as Yellow mountain. On my previous trip to china i'd been told by many friends that a visit to huang shan was a must. I'd actually been looking forward to this trip as it was opportunity to get away from the hoardes of people and breathe some fresh air.Unfortunately as i later found out, huangshan is the place for neither of these things!

Ok, so when I think of hiking i always hark back to the memories of national parks and peaks in australia. pristine air, tranquility, scurrying creatures in the bush, and a distinct lack of humans.
But of course, this being China, hiking here is a much different experience.

Huangshan being the famous attraction it is draws many a crowd to its lofty cloud covered peaks, interantionally and moreover dometically. And with chinas population of 1 billion +, on any given weekend you choose to visit you're bound to bump into the other few hundred that also decided upon that same weekend! You don't really manage to get away from the crowds of your home city, you sorta just trade a local crowd for a national one. and yes, they all bring their phlegm with them.
At least you don't have to worry about being rammed by a wayward bicycle or electric scooter up there. Because theres two passenger cable car routes operating up the mountain it means accessibility to many more people who otherwise wouldn't have been fit enough to scale the mountain. Not that fitness is the only factor preventing one from scaling the mountain. You'd also have to be slightly bonkers to try negotiating some parts of the climb as safety provision can be as little as a chain running around a rock face and narrow steps. I guess thats why they built the cable cars!
So yeah, with the cable cars any man and his dog can now reach the summit of huangshan. once you're up there hiking = walking up a lot of steps.

With the volume of people visiting each weekend, queue times can take up to 3 hours for the cable car. fortunately it was only 1 hour when we went. However, once up in the mountain you run into a new concept of hiking unique to china, queuing! yep, queuing for lookout points, queuing for the famous sites, queuing just to get damn past!

I can accept the fact theres so many people in china, but what i can't accept is all the tourgroups and their megaphones blaring away! and the normal speaking volume of some chinese people is already so loud that when combined with a megaphone, one can hear them from any part of the mountain. Which brings me to the next unique thing about huangshan. the distinct lack of wildlife. Over the entire weekend i believe i only saw 1 squirrel, and 5 birds, and that was only when we ventured far off track. seems that all the noise of the crowds, megaphones, and jackhammers building the next hotel, have scared them all away.
On a side note, you'll notice some very strange hiking attire sported by the chinese, and i will devote a whole blog entry to this in the future more generally about sporting attire. It wasn't unsual to see guys in business suits or women looking like they ready to go out on the town.

The last thing I'll moan about before i get to the good points is the air. Despite all the no-smoking signs fixated everywhere, it's still a chimney up there with all the men puffing away. Yes, theres no pollution from any factories in huangshan, but it's sorta just exchanged for cigarette smoke from all the tourists. I'm suprised huangshan hasn't burned up yet due to forest fires.

If you can get over the crowds, huangshan really is a beautiful place, and the views from the top towards over peaks are breathtaking. Often clouds and mist (or the confluence of cigarette smoke?) would roll in over a matter of minutes and obscure the view, but when the peaks are drapped within them it cetainly gives it an ethereal feel. Appart from the views, huangshan is famed for it's Ying Ke Song (welcoming tree, nb theres also a farewell tree!). Aptly named as the shape of the tree resembles an outstretched palm, beckoning visitors to enter. Before going I'd been told by several of my chinese students that parts of the famous tree were actually fake or enhanced. Haha. no suprise there. apparently, some parts of the tree aren't looking as lush in it's old age, and also if it looks more impressive more tourist $$$ will roll in. i didn't study the tree closely enough to see what sort of 'enhancements 'had been made, whether it be a spraypaint makeover or complete plastic branches!







yep, you can't escape the commercialism of China, even up on the summit of huangshan. why, upon reaching the top of lotus peak, one of the highest points on the summit, you'll be greeted by a small stand where two guys are engraving gold or bronze medals with your name, all for a mere 10 rmb. I didn't get one done, but i'm sure it said something like 'I made it to the top of lotus peak [insert name here and date here]'.

the other drawcard of huangshan is it's famed rocks that supposedly resemble stuff. Now I say 'supposedly' because i couldn't see the resemblance to any of the given names, or the connection seemed a little bit of a stretch.


The first one here is called 'Monkey gazing over the sea of clouds'. Monkey? Really? I would've called it 'Kidney bean gaving over sea of clouds'. I think the huangshan tourism department were just dying to somehow connect it with a monkey since it relates to the monkey king from monkey magic (do love that show though).

And this next one is called 'flying over rock', which makes no sense to me at all. maybe the meaning was lost in translation. I know it's morbid, but i would've called it 'tombstone'.

We probably passed dozens of other rocks that have been labelled with other obscure names, but we just didn't know what we were looking at. If the rock formation looked funky, we took a picture of it. Didn't try standing there going cross eyed to make out the resemblance (i've read theres one called 'pig headed monk eat watermelon')

The last thing to mention about huangshan is all the porters that carry up the goods to the hotels and stores on the summit. if you happen to pass a porter when there aren't many people around he'll usually offer to sell his foodstuffs to you at a discount price to what is charged up on the summit. If the porters can unload some stock it makes their load a little lighter and easier to carry up to the top. as an example, bananas sell for about 5 rmb each on the summit, while we managed to bag 3 for 10rmb. Actually we coulda haggled a bit more since the girl after us got 4 for 10rmb. dammit.