Preface to a Journey Through Zhangjiajie
Preface to a Journey Through Zhangjiajie, by Kang Zhuo. The car had long since turned north, climbing straight up the mountain along the newly built road, passing through several valleys that gradually rose, winding around several mountainsides that gradually rose, and again winding back and forth countless times, panting and crawling upward along the mountain road. It looked as though there were no longer many high ridges left to climb, only the unbroken mountain ranges on both sides of the left boundary. Moreover, in terms of distance, it was about right. Yet there was not the slightest trace of Zhangjiajie, and the driver in the car was also making his first trip there...
A Preface to Zhangjiajie
by Kang Zhuo
The car had long since turned north, climbing straight up along the newly built road, passing through several valleys that rose steadily, winding around several mountainsides that rose steadily, and after countless meandering turns back and forth, panting and crawling up the winding mountain road, it seemed there were no more high ridges left to climb, only the unbroken chain of mountains on either side. Moreover, by distance we should have been nearly there, yet there was not a trace of Zhangjiajie. The driver, too, was here for the first time and equally could not say. The driver of the car ahead, in which Comrade Ding Ling was riding, had been here before, but there was no way to ask him. The mountains on both sides looked exactly alike—how could we not keep doubting and discussing anxiously?
Just as our spirits were low, the car followed the one ahead, suddenly turned a corner, sped on for a stretch, and stopped at the gate of a building. Comrade Ding Ling got out, climbed the steps, turned around and stood gazing upward. We too stopped, got out, looked up, and gazed at each other. For a moment everyone seemed suddenly stunned. Thinking back afterward, I was then simply dumbfounded, like a fool—as if clearly walking on a broad road yet suddenly entering a dead end, which would only make one turn back in vexation. But at that moment, after the abrupt shock, I could not help vividly recalling the words of Du Fu's poem: Where is the sorrow? Joy verges on madness; tears soak my garments. I truly wanted to leap high with sudden surprise and joy.
Comrade Ding Ling was still gazing upward. Yet she seemed to have awakened, as it were, gently shaking her head and murmuring to herself:
Truly beautiful! Ah, how lovely!
Indeed worthy of endless praise—we had arrived at the gate of the guesthouse, and also at the gate of Zhangjiajie. And the moment we entered the gate, fantastic peaks rose before us. On both sides, peak after peak stretched inward in unbroken succession, each with its own extraordinary form, vying in majesty and beauty, competing in splendor and radiance. But turning outward, it was as if they had put on disguise—the rocks and trees were no more than ordinary human world! And yet, having just turned into the Qingyan Mouth, could this really be heaven on earth?
This was before dusk on the afternoon of October 23, 1982. A group of us accompanying Comrade Ding Ling had set out from Peach Blossom Spring in the morning, stopping to visit the Taoyuan Normal School where Ding Ling had studied from 1918 to 1919. Passing through Cili County, we ascended Zhangjiajie in the rain. Peach Blossom Spring is famous at home and abroad; yesterday afternoon we had visited it for a long time, yet all its scenic spots were still comprehensible. Zhangjiajie's reputation had begun to spread, but the moment we saw it we could not help being stunned, our thoughts wandering, at a loss for words. Who in the world has ever encountered a fairyland with no prior information? Who has ever seen those fantastical peaks opposite the Zhangjiajie guesthouse?
Take just the tallest of them: it rises from the ground almost vertically, piercing the heavens! The whole mountain has none of the yellow earth, stones, and miscellaneous trees seen along the way; instead, layer upon layer of angular orange-yellow weathered stone is stacked and built up. The first layer of weathered stone looks like one large block, slightly different in height and area from the others; between the layers and angles there is also yellow and black earth, and trees of every strange shape and form thrust out from the crevices—some stretching flat, some slanting, some bending again to grow straight toward the sky. More importantly, this mountain does appear vertical, but on closer taste, its cliffs are by no means sheer walls: the first layer of stone blocks is rather large, the second somewhat smaller, the third larger still, and above that each layer is either small or large, very small or extremely large, while the edges and corners of the large stone layers protrude irregularly in all directions, so that it looks just like building blocks casually and reluctantly assembled by children, stacked in an order of size so unstable that a slight slip would make it collapse. Yet this rock has stood towering and motionless for at least ten million years, always steep, sheer, and magnificent!
Ah, one must by no means praise only a single rock—each rock displays its own wonder and uniqueness. To be sure, some differ only slightly while sharing much in common, but more truly share much in common while differing greatly. During our day's journey it rained most of the way, but as we neared Zhangjiajie the rain stopped. Thus, merely viewing the rocks and peaks before the guesthouse already made us feel there was more beauty than we could take in. After dinner, when we rested indoors and discussed the schedule, Comrade Ding Ling found herself in a dilemma.
It turned out that at the end of our itinerary, Vice Governor Long of the Xiangxi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture and Director Wang of the Prefecture Party Committee Propaganda Department had driven up to meet us and to escort Comrade Ding Ling to Jishou, where the prefectural government was located. Ding Ling had been to Jishou in 1954 and had not yet seen some of the places she wanted to see. This time she had intended to go again, but from Zhangjiajie to Jishou a car would take at least a full day. If she stayed in Jishou only one day, the round trip would take three days. Yet Comrade Ding Ling's main purpose this time was to return to her home village, and she had only just reached the normal school where she had studied, but had not yet returned to her old home in Linli County. Her entire time in this area was only five or six days. So Comrade Ding Ling said:
“Governor Long, Director Wang, I'm sorry. This time I cannot go to Jishou. If I were to go, I could visit Zhangjiajie for at most one day tomorrow, or a little more than half a day. I am 78 years old. For such a rare mountain and river beauty of our motherland, seeing it for only a day or half a day is far too little! Let me look a couple more days. As for going to the autonomous prefecture, I will have to consider it another time.” She turned to me and said: “Kang Zhuo, you have to get to Jishou the day after tomorrow for a meeting, so you go first. We'll meet again in Changsha.”
The governor and the department director had no choice but to agree with regret, and Governor Long said to me:
“Then you too can only look for one day tomorrow.” He also felt regret about this.
Comrade Ding Ling said: “This time you can consider it just a beginning. Come again later and have a good look.”
This time it can only count as writing a preface first, I said: let it be called a preface tour.
The next morning, in what seemed like rain and mist, I accompanied Comrade Ding Ling to Golden Whip Stream, continuing my preface tour.
This is a small stream flowing from Zhangjiajie in Dayong County to Suoxiyu in Cili County. Zhangjiajie, Suoxiyu, and Tianzi Mountain in Sangzhi County form a tight triangle, closely adjoining one another. These three newly discovered scenic areas have already formed a national forest park, generally all called Zhangjiajie. Golden Whip Stream is pinched between mountains on both sides. At its narrowest it is only four or five meters wide; at its broadest more than ten meters. The stream water winds back and forth around stones and green grass, turning corners and linking in nine bends, and along the way one can only walk. Sometimes one naturally has to cross wooden bridges, stone bridges, or stepping stones. Where the stream is even smaller, one step can cross it. We set out from the guesthouse—that is, the Golden Whip Rock Hotel—passed the forest farm headquarters, and passed the main course of the stream between the two mountains. At once we felt that this stream really was like a whip, though the stream valley and both banks appeared deep and verdant, so it was also like a golden whip. It is called Golden Whip Stream, it seems, because the layered rocks of the mountains on both sides are orange-gold and jade-green, and their reflections dye the whip of the stream golden. Moreover, as soon as one leaves the hotel, among the peaks ranged inward like a procession, far off stands a vertical, heaven-piercing golden cliff peak somewhat like a whip—that is Golden Whip Rock, close by the stream, though from afar it does not yet look very much like a whip.
After entering Golden Whip Stream, pinched between two mountains, what draws attention is no longer the stream but the confronting rocks. For now it is like walking into an alley: mountains tower on both sides, a single line of blue sky above, and one can scarcely see or sense that nearby there are still the quite extensive Huangshizhai and Yaozi Village mountain ridges. And those are two major climbing scenic spots of Zhangjiajie! Yet Golden Whip Stream is truly like a locked lane, and the wondrous scenery of the mountains on both sides is even more than the eye can take in. Just at the stream mouth is a Guimen Rock on the left; halfway up the mountain there is indeed a small, deep stone cave like a boudoir gate, drawing one in. Then, further on the left, another mountain is named Drunken Arhat. Its layered rocks are no longer all angular; instead they include round, plump, diamond-shaped, and even irregular uneven stacks, so that truly ten thousand stone arhats seem drunk, stumbling and swaying their heads. Then, turning to look at the mountain ridge on the right—why, is this not exactly a golden whip stabbing straight into the nine heavens!
No wonder Golden Whip Rock has such high renown that even the guesthouse hotel must be named after it. It turns out that from a distant angle one does not see its true face entirely, so it does not look much like a golden whip. Only when one reaches it and looks up does one suddenly feel astonished and shaken, truly doubting how the world could steadily support such a golden whip made of stacked earth and stone, wrapped with many trees large and small, slender and ever more solitary as it rises into the clouds! Would this golden whip not eventually bend? Ah, no need to worry! Just ahead, close by, stands a slightly lower rock, whose summit resembles a divine eagle. Thus the mountain is named “Divine Eagle Guards the Whip,” and for ten million years it has guarded it so that the golden whip will not bend or fall.
Walking further, several mountains on the left are named in turn “Cleaving the Mountain to Save the Mother,” “Heavenly Books Hung High,” and “Sea-Calming Divine Needle,” and on tasting them they indeed all seem similar. There are also the upright “Green Pines Stacked in Verdure” on the cliffs and the “Wall-Hanging Pine” suspended upside down on the sheer rock, all enchanting. I recalled that more than a year earlier, when there was not even a guesthouse, the internationally renowned Hong Kong photographer Mr. Chen Fuli had disregarded hardship and come here to stay in a farmer's home, climbing mountains and braving dangers, taking photographs for a week. About this, Comrade Ding Ling said:
“It was worth it! If I stayed a few more days, it would be worth it too!”
The morning rain and mist had long since stopped. After a brief rest at noon, Comrade Ding Ling wanted to go see the Couple Rock. Since I was on a preface tour, anything was fine, so I accompanied her again.
Actually, Couple Rock can be seen as soon as one leaves the guesthouse, but because the direction is wrong, one sees only the rock and not the couple. We rode a short distance by car, then left the dirt road and climbed a slope for a while, following a small path up to a height of about two hundred meters, and were led to a platform by the slope enclosed by a wooden railing. Leaning toward the front railing and looking up, on the rock several dozen meters away, a flat stone surface faced us at an angle, and on that surface the stones were exactly two side-by-side human faces with clear outlines: on one side, distinctly, a strong and handsome man; on this side, plainly, a simple laboring woman leaning against the man—what a loving couple! Perhaps the woman looked a little older, but they respected and cherished each other, making one envious. Only, if one viewed from slightly to the side, it was not so clear.
The platform could hold only a few people, and those who went up were always reluctant to leave. Our small group unconsciously took turns looking for a long time. On the way back, turning and looking as we walked, we also saw a mountain called “Zhong Kui Captures the Monster” and another called “Qin Hui Kneeling in Repentance”; on careful reflection, they all resembled their names. Truly the peaks vied in beauty and majesty, displaying wonders and striving in peril. Why was it that this divine mountain and precious realm, seemingly not of the human world, was never discovered by Xu Xiake, the traveler of such great fame in our country's history? Just as I was openly lamenting this, I heard Comrade Ding Ling say:
“Xu Xiake did not discover it, but the common people discovered it long ago. The people discovered it long ago!”
Yes, indeed. Was not every rare wonder here, and each of their exquisite names, discovered and created by the people? And how many more scenic spots and brilliantly varied names does Zhangjiajie still have! Especially Tianzi Mountain—how many more! Following Golden Whip Stream to Suoxiyu, is there not also a ten-li stretch where the beauty is endless, which the common people since ancient times have named “Ten-Mile Gallery”? Have not experts also discovered in this area animals, plants, and wild trees and flowers never known before, while the common people had long recognized, understood, and named them? How can mountains and rivers, scenery and things, be separated from the country, the people, and one's own land! Likewise, when people tour mountains and view scenery, they certainly do not do so only to feast their eyes; clearly they also seek to broaden their knowledge, cultivate their character, and foster a rich and noble spiritual outlook, so as to accomplish more for the cause of the country and the people. Comrade Ding Ling, nearly eighty, still spared no effort climbing up and down slopes, infatuated with the wondrous rock scenery—surely this was precisely why, and it is enough to serve as a model.
Unfortunately I must leave now. So as not to forget to come again, I specially publish this preface tour as a way of urging it on.
Night of March 14, 1985, in Changsha