Zhangjiajie Attraction Recommendation—Huanglong Cave
Magical Zhangjiajie, with its three thousand peaks and eight hundred streams, is a fairyland everyone yearns for. And the beautiful Huanglong Cave is a must-visit for every guest to Zhangjiajie...
This article is compiled from the original travel notes on the "Zhangjiajie Tour Guide Network" (33519.com); it is a record of trips from earlier years. Time-sensitive information such as ticket prices, schedules, and accommodation prices is subject to the latest announcements from scenic areas and transportation authorities; the itinerary ideas and attraction introductions still have reference value.
Magical Zhangjiajie, with three thousand strange peaks and eight hundred beautiful waters, is a fairyland that everyone longs for, and the beautiful Yellow Dragon Cave is a attraction that every visitor to Zhangjiajie cannot miss.
Yellow Dragon Cave is a famous karst cave attraction in the Wulingyuan scenic and historic interest area of Zhangjiajie. It is renowned worldwide for top honors such as 'World Karst Cave Wonder,' 'World All-Around Karst Cave Champion,' and 'China's Most Beautiful Tourist Karst Cave.' The total explored area of the cave floor is now 100,000 square meters. The cave body is divided into four levels, with caves within caves, mountains within caves, caves within mountains, and rivers within caves. According to investigations by Chinese and foreign geological experts, Yellow Dragon Cave's scale, completeness of content, and beauty of scenery encompass all aspects of karst cave studies.
With its three-dimensional cave structure, vast cave space, broad Dragon Palace Hall, tens of thousands of stalagmites, tall cave waterfalls, and tour routes featuring both water and land, Yellow Dragon Cave forms a highly distinctive tourist cave at home and abroad. Inside the cave there are 1 reservoir, 2 rivers, 3 pools, 4 waterfalls, 13 large halls, 98 corridors, as well as dozens of peaks, thousands of white jade pools, and nearly ten thousand stalagmites. Stalactites, stalagmites, stone columns, stone flowers, stone curtains, stone branches, stone tubes, stone pearls, stone corals, and more, formed by the condensation of calcareous solution, are found throughout, all marvelous and full of wonders, like a magical underground 'demon palace.' Yellow Dragon Cave has now opened six major tour areas, including Dragon Dance Hall, Xiangshui River, Tianxian Waterfall, Tianzhu Street, and Dragon Palace. Its main landscapes include more than 100 features such as the Dinghai Shenzhen, Ten-Thousand-Year Cedar, Dragon King's Throne, Rocket Launch, Huaguo Mountain, Tianxian Waterfall, Conch Blowing to the Sky, Double Gates Welcoming Guests, Vicissitudes of Life, and Loess Plateau.
Front Hall
After passing through the 'Double Gates Welcoming Guests,' you arrive at the first large hall of Yellow Dragon Cave, the Gathering Hall. This hall gives people a sudden feeling of openness. It is the smallest of the thirteen halls in Yellow Dragon Cave, with an area of about 6,000 square meters. In the opposite place with dim lights and dense stalagmites is the Dragon Stage, said to be the place where the Dragon King danced. On this day every year, the Dragon King holds a grand ball here.
Pagoda Peak
The 'Pagoda Peak' used by the Dragon King to uphold justice and suppress evil, and two yellow and white stalagmites, are the weapons 'Golden Spear and Silver Lance' used by the Dragon King in battle. At the top of the golden spear on the right there is also a Guanyin Bodhisattva, and below there is a group of stone monkeys climbing upward, so it is called 'Group of Monkeys Worshipping Guanyin.' Its formation is the result of misalignment and changes in direction of the dripping water from the cave ceiling.
Xiangshui River
Cruising along the leisurely Xiangshui River, you can reach an underground river in the second level of Yellow Dragon Cave. Xiangshui River is 2,820 meters long in total, with an average water depth of 6 meters and a maximum depth of 12 meters. The water temperature remains at 16°C, making it an ideal living environment for the giant salamander, a national first-class key protected animal. Boating on Xiangshui River, the channel is winding, the empty valley is deep and secluded, the water is deep and distant, the banks are steep and the vault is high. Now you look up, now you lean, now bright, now dark. Gazing into the high and distant places, all is hazy, as if returning to the chaotic primeval era, full of mysterious allure. Along Xiangshui River there are many magical cave landscapes, such as the Dragon King's Golden Helmet, Sea Shells Floating in the Air, Conch Blowing to the Sky, Hidden Dragon Gorge, Incense Inserting Platform, and Tianxian Bridge.
'Loess Plateau'
Arriving at the Tianxian Palace scenic area, Tianxian Palace is the widest hall in Yellow Dragon Cave, 96 meters wide from north to south and 105 meters long from east to west. On the right is a huge stone waterfall group, 62 meters wide from north to south, 105 meters wide from east to west, with a drop of 40 meters. It is the largest stone waterfall group among currently developed tourist caves in China. In karst cave studies it is called 'bottom flowstone.' It is a secondary calcium carbonate deposit formed during the flow of sheet-like water produced by dripping from the cave ceiling across the cave floor. Because the cave ceiling is relatively thin and the mud content in the water is relatively high, the flowstone waterfall appears yellow in color. Therefore we have also given it a vivid name—'Loess Plateau.'
'Ten Thousand Dragon Fields'
It is said that the Dragon King's 'Ten Thousand Dragon Fields' are this patch of pastoral scenery in Yellow Dragon Cave, crisscrossed like field paths and undulating like waves. In karst cave studies it is called a 'flowstone dam,' also called 'sour field.' It is formed by flowing water, and the protruding direction of the flowstone dam is the direction of the water flow at that time. The Dragon King's dragon fields naturally have guaranteed harvests despite drought or flood, and their irrigation source is the 'Tianxian Water Waterfall' above. Tianxian Water Waterfall is the largest of the three springs in Yellow Dragon Cave, pouring down like smoke and mist from the honeycomb-shaped cave ceiling grotto 30 meters high, forming a magnificent waterfall wonder. It flows continuously through all four seasons, with a drop of 27.3 meters, truly possessing the momentum of 'the flying stream plunges down three thousand feet, as if the Milky Way falls from the ninth heaven.' How was Tianxian Water Waterfall formed? In fact, above the cave ceiling is a high mountain covered with dense forest. Surface water there gathers into streams, seeps down through cracks in the cave ceiling, and thus forms Tianxian Water Waterfall.
'Dragon Palace Hall'
The highest level of Yellow Dragon Cave, the fourth level, is the 'Dragon Palace Hall.' It is 16–30 meters above the third-level passage of Huaguo Mountain and Tianzhu Street. Dragon Palace Hall is the largest hall in Yellow Dragon Cave, also the first-formed and oldest hall in Yellow Dragon Cave, and the hall with the most developed stalagmites among currently opened tourist caves in China. Its floor area is 14,000 square meters, and the average height of the cave ceiling is 40 meters. There are 1,705 stalagmites and stone columns extant, of which 516 are taller than 1 meter. The distribution density of stalagmites is 0.12 per square meter. The entire Dragon Palace is majestic and grand, rugged and imposing. Numerous stalagmites resemble people or objects, remarkably true to life, in countless forms and full of variety, some like birds and beasts, some like palace treasures, some like towering cedars, and some like rockets ascending into the sky.
The main scenic spots of the Dragon Palace in Yellow Dragon Cave include the Dragon King's Throne, Rocket Base, Conch Hiding Place, Golden Rooster Crowing at Dawn, Ten-Thousand-Year Cedar, Rear Palace, Dinghai Shenzhen, and Echo Wall. The most famous are the three great wonders: the Dragon King's Throne, the Ten-Thousand-Year Cedar, and the Dinghai Shenzhen. The 'Dragon King's Throne' is the largest stalagmite in Yellow Dragon Cave. In terms of morphological structure, it consists of two parts: the upper part is a thick stalagmite, 12 meters high with a base diameter of 10 meters; the lower base is a bottom flowstone slope (stone waterfall), with a drop of more than 10 meters and a circumference of about 50 meters. As for its formation, because the drip volume from the cave ceiling above the Dragon King's Throne is relatively large, most of the dripping water transforms into layered water flow that runs down along the sides of the stalagmite and the bottom slope, continuously thickening its diameter and forming a large flowstone waterfall at its base.
The tall and slender 'Dinghai Shenzhen' has a very peculiar shape. It is 19.2 meters high, thick at both ends and thin in the middle, with the thinnest part only 10 centimeters in diameter. The 'Dinghai Shenzhen' grows on a collapsed slope and is the tallest stalagmite in Yellow Dragon Cave. Cave scientists estimate that it needed at least nearly 200,000 years to grow to its present height. The upper end of the 'Dinghai Shenzhen' is still 6 meters from the cave ceiling, and there is still dripping water at the top, so it is still growing. It is estimated that another 60,000 years will be needed for it to 'stand upright between heaven and earth.'
The Maze is the most essential scenic area in Yellow Dragon Cave. The Maze is located at the lowest level of Yellow Dragon Cave. There are many types of stalactites in the cave, and the landscapes are exceptionally concentrated. The white and crystal-clear stalactites, stalagmites, stone columns, stone curtains, stone flowers, helictites, stone pearls, stone corals, and more are exquisite and translucent, densely packed, untouched by dust. The karst cave landscapes are dazzling and beautiful beyond description, with endless mystery. Compared with the rugged and majestic Dragon Palace of Yellow Dragon Cave, the Maze is even more exquisite and gorgeous. Former Vice Premier of the State Council Zou Jiahua once wrote an inscription for it: 'China's rivers and mountains are so charming, the Yellow Dragon Maze makes one bow.'
With its three-dimensional cave structure, vast cave space, broad Dragon Palace Hall, tens of thousands of stalagmites, tall cave waterfalls, and tour routes featuring both water and land, Yellow Dragon Cave forms a tourist cave unique at home and abroad. Since opening, Yellow Dragon Cave has received 8 million domestic and overseas visitors, and has successively received Party and state leaders such as Hu Yaobang, Qiao Shi, Li Ruihuan, and Li Lanqing, as well as many famous scientists, leading artists, and literary figures. In 1998, Yellow Dragon Cave also successfully received its first foreign head of state—President Mkapa of Tanzania. In the same year, after inspecting Yellow Dragon Cave, Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa gladly wrote an inscription: 'Yellow Dragon Wonder Cave, breathtaking.' In 2004, after visiting and inspecting Yellow Dragon Cave, Thai Princess Sirindhorn wrote: 'Dream World.'