Speaking of Tianzi Mountain
Speaking of Tianzi Mountain by Gu Hua. Eight hundred waters, three thousand peaks, Tianzi Mountain's colors are green like smoke, the dense stone forest comes before the eyes, purple air rises as if one would become immortal! Springs flow beyond heaven and earth, cliffs hidden among clouds and rainbows... This is a passage I wrote impromptu on Tianzi Mountain in late spring, with no intention of excessive praise. Before the uncanny workmanship of nature and the creations of heaven and earth, I only felt that paper was pale, words clumsy, strength insufficient, and my pen inadequate. Tianzi Mountain is also called Qingyan Mountain and is commonly known as Yuanjiajie...
Talking about Tianzi Mountain
By Gu Hua
Eight hundred streams, three thousand peaks, Tianzi Mountain's scenery green as mist, the stone forest dense before your eyes, purple clouds rising as if one would become immortal! Springs flow beyond heaven and earth, cliffs hidden among the clouds……
This was in late spring, a few impromptu lines I wrote on Tianzi Mountain, with no intent of overpraise. Before the uncanny workmanship of nature and the creations of heaven, I only felt the paper too pale, the words too clumsy, my strength unequal to the task, my brush inadequate.
Tianzi Mountain is also called Qingyan Mountain, commonly known as Yuanjiajie, named after the heroic legend of an ancient Tujia leader, "King Tianzi Xiang," who gathered his followers and raised arms on the mountain. It nestles against the famous scenic area Suoxiyu and the national forest park Zhangjiajie, arm in arm as neighbors, a virgin natural scenic land still awaiting development, yet already praised by photographers and traditional Chinese painters as "beauty unmatched under heaven, a mountain's heights unknown to man."
Interestingly enough, this vast natural scenic plateau was discovered in early 1980 by several photographers who had traveled all the famous mountains and great rivers of the world. Before that, it had of course been lonely for ages, a remote corner of the earth. On the plateau lived fifty or sixty households of hardworking Tujia brothers and sisters. Only three small paths wound down the mountain, connecting it with the outside world. Yet in 1958, earthen blast furnaces had also been built on the plateau, with smoke rolling, ancient trees a thousand years old felled to burn charcoal and smelt steel. Later a commune and brigade farm was set up here, with slash-and-burn farming, sorghum and corn. During the "Cultural Revolution," some "five black categories" and abandoned people from below the mountain were driven up to this "desert island" plateau to live, as a place of exile under mass dictatorship. The world was bizarre and motley, everyone had no time for themselves, so who cared about this heavenly terrace, this fairyland within the realm? It was merely many towering, strange rocks…… When the photographers hiked up to the Tianzi Mountain plateau, at first their eyes were dazzled and they gasped in amazement, then they shouted: Beauty crowns the world, every place a painted screen! An old photographer spent half a month running all over the 33-square-kilometer plateau and shot a hundred rolls of film, as if the wondrous peaks and beautiful valleys up and down the mountain were a mirage that would vanish from before his eyes in an instant. Following in the photographers' footsteps were traditional Chinese painters from within and outside the province. They were in no hurry, as if it were a gift from heaven, painting scenes by the cliffs here, devoted to ink and brush, giving free rein to their art, absorbing the spirit of the mountains and rivers to nourish their artistic minds…… After that, the unfamiliar name Tianzi Mountain began to appear in pictorials and art journals. Art demonstrated its unique social influence. Then forest survey teams came, rare animal and plant investigation groups came, deep-valley exploration teams came, karst geologists came, students and teachers from biology and fine arts departments of universities and colleges came, and young men and women from nearby towns courting each other also came. There were also compatriots from Hong Kong and Macao, Japanese friends, and overseas Chinese. Although on the Tianzi Mountain plateau there was temporarily no highway, no hotel, not even a little girl selling soda or popsicles; when thirsty one could only drink the mineral water gurgling everywhere on the mountain, sweet, cool, and clear; when hungry one could only pick the wild kiwi fruit hanging like golden bells all over the mountain and eat self-prepared dry rations. If one had no tent, at night one could only lodge in the wooden houses of the Tujia brothers, sit by the fire pit, drink brewed tea, listen to the old people tell ancient tales and the young women sing, and enjoy "Dongdongkui" (Tujia wind instrument) performances. Truly, one sleeps with the pine waves as a pillow and dreams into the land of Penglai.
Tianzi Mountain, you virgin scenic land still awaiting development, why are you so magically alluring? People do not fear sweating profusely as they climb the stone steps of your mountain paths at over a thousand meters high; they do not enjoy the comforts of modern life, but come to appreciate your primitive, wild elegance, your heaven-crafted mountain rocks?
I stayed on Tianzi Mountain for some days before I unlocked this hidden secret. The Tianzi Mountain plateau is a water-eroded peak forest canyon landform, with clear bedding structures and well-preserved biological fossils. It is covered by primeval forest, rare birds and animals appear, and exotic flowers and plants bloom unfailingly. What is especially captivating is that amid the vast green trees, stone pillars and stone walls rise from the ground one after another, like ancient castles, like stone generals, like jade pillars holding up the sky, like pagodas seated on the earth, like palaces reaching the clouds, like lovers meeting in secret, like scholars facing a wall, like young wives gazing for their husbands' return…… in a thousand postures, too beautiful to take in all at once. Around Tianzi Mountain, above and below, there are the Stone Forest Road, Scenic Terrace Road, Cave Mansion Road, and Twin Peaks Road, arranged in layers for three-dimensional touring, with peaks above peaks and heaven above heaven. Among them, the 90-li Ring Island Scenic Terrace Road connects seven major scenic areas of Tianzi Mountain, 84 natural viewing platforms, as well as one heavenly bridge, two heavenly pools, the historic sites of the upper, middle, and lower Tianzi Temples, four self-born gates in the east, south, west, and north, five cliffside silver waterfalls, six karst cave mansions, seven stone boats putting out to sea, and eight-sided stone screens locking the formation……
Since Tianzi Mountain is an island-like plateau, all around are steep cliffs, and along the cliffs natural viewing platforms have formed one after another, all in the shape of narrow peninsulas. With sparse trees, they wind forward, thrusting into secluded valleys, extending dozens of meters or hundreds of meters, then stopping abruptly, with sheer cliffs soaring into the air and rock dropping thousands of feet!
Soul-stirring, extraordinarily wonderful and perilous. At the end of each viewing platform, there is a bluestone cap, smooth and level, for people to sit in meditation by the cliff, taking in all the beauty, floating as if ascended to the realm of immortals. Moreover, morning and evening, day and rain, the scenery changes without limit. Sitting on the platform in the morning, mist spreads flat, the whole valley silver-scaled, white as cotton. One sees clusters of dark blue stone peaks emerge from the mist, with short pines crowning the peaks, mountain flowers dotting them, green vines hanging upside down, like islands and shores, as if one could stroll over to visit; sitting on the platform at dusk, the sun sets in the west, evening clouds spit flame, the peak forest seems drunk, mist and haze about to burn, where firefly light flickers in the secluded valley, one suspects it is a tavern in a foreign land; sitting on the platform at night, clear breeze blowing, the sky low and the Milky Way near, stars and moon together, one can reach up and touch them, chaos as one body, heaven and the human world; sitting on the platform after rain, watching Tianzi Mountain's cloud waterfalls and mist seas is even more refreshing to the heart and expansive to the mind: now the mountain is full of rolling clouds, like snow waves pounding the sky, surging without bound; now like a flock of sheep gathered in tens of millions, wriggling and darting, grazing in the blue sky; now the clouds vanish, turning into huge silver waterfalls pouring straight from ten-thousand-fathom cliffs into deep abysses, not dispersing for a long time. If these silver waterfalls meet the morning sun or evening glow, they transform into bolts of seven-colored brocade draped over the peak forest, magnificent and spectacular……
Ah, Tianzi Mountain, enchanting mountain, magical mountain! Intoxicating, clinging, stirring the heart and soul. "Not Huangshan, yet better than Huangshan," this was the heartfelt eight-character truth inscribed by a photographer over seventy years old from Beijing after twice hiking up to Tianzi Mountain. "Whoever knows the face of 'Tianzi,' on returning will not look at other mountains under heaven," this was a wildly expressive cursive calligraphy left by a calligrapher from another place who, overjoyed after climbing Tianzi Mountain, could not contain himself.
Tianzi Mountain has already formed an indissoluble bond with art. However, for the sake of the Four Modernizations, Tianzi Mountain should first be a tourist resort, a famous summer mountain, and it already possesses superior conditions: first, convenient transportation, with the new railway line "Zhi-Liu Line" passing nearby; second, a broad scenic area, with 20,000 mu of stone forest, 40,000 mu of primeval secondary forest, and the Tianzi plateau itself 45,000 mu, mostly well preserved, undamaged and unharmed; third, a pleasant climate with distinct four seasons; fourth, gentle slopes on the plateau, suitable both for widely planting fruit trees and flowers and for building roads and constructing pavilions and hotels; fifth, abundant water sources on the plateau, with sweet, cool water quality, enough for 100,000 tourists to drink; sixth, rich natural resources, with all five of the world's major plant families complete here.
Tianzi Mountain will repay, will give back! On that day when guests from the five continents arrive in droves and visitors from the four seas forget to return.