Stairway to Heaven
After the commotion of Beijing, we were looking forward to spending a few days somewhere quieter. A sacred mountain and the home town of Confucius were on the way to Shanghai and that sounded like the perfect stop. The town of Tai’an still had plenty of energy and the mountain is a pilgrimage for Chinese people so we didn’t really find the peaceful spot we were looking for. We did get to climb up about 7,000 steps, so it was still a productive day.
We arrived on the bullet train from Beijing, only three hours. The trains were about the same as we saw in Japan, quite impressive. They have a weird policy of continuing to sell tickets to a full train so there were a bunch of people without seats. This made for a slightly more noisy and crowded experience. After finding our hotel, we set out on a search for food. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite dinner time and the street vendors weren’t setup yet. Apparently everyone in town eats from these carts because we could only find one restaurant within a six block radius of our hotel. The streets were busy with shoppers and there were plenty of places to buy clothes, but the only place serving food that afternoon was McDonalds.
The next day we went for a walk, up and down the longest staircase we have ever seen. The elevation change was almost 5,000 feet from the temple at the bottom to the one at the top and the whole path is paved with stone steps. It was a big day for our legs and knees. This mountain, Tai Shan, is the most important of the five sacred mountains of Taoism. The trail up passes numerous temples, and has quite a large complex at the top. Important people have been climbing this mountain for around 3,000 years, so I suppose we shouldn’t have been so surprised at the infrastructure in place. It is supposed to be a significant journey, and the stones were purposely laid straight up the mountain to create an imposing sight and difficult climb. Signs along the way described it as the Stairway to Heaven.
This is a big tourist spot for the Chinese, and the whole place was full of people. Not wanting to miss out on such an opportunity, the path was lined with vendors selling water, snacks, and a large selection of trinkets. It was a big contrast to our normal hikes where we just walk through a forest and have to worry about how much water to bring. Not everyone takes the fun way up either. For a rather hefty price there is a bus half way up and a cable car to the top. There are several restaurants, even a hotel on top if you want to spend the night and see the sunrise. Despite all the ruckus, we went through the South Gate to Heaven, walked along the Avenue of Heaven, made our way past the Azure Cloud Temple, and up to the Jade Emperor Peak. We walked around behind the small temple at the peak and finally found what we usually see on top of mountains, a view of the other side.
Back at the base of the hill, we found another ancient cultural site to visit. An hour long bus ride brought us to Qufu, the home town of Master Kong, or more commonly known as Confucius. The main attraction here was the Confucius Temple. Originally a small temple created in his honor, it has been expanded by several emperors over the past 2,000 years and is now quite a large complex that covers most of the original town. The architecture of this temple, the one at the base of Tai Shan, and the Forbidden City in Beijing are said to be the only ones that have features of an imperial palace, and some of the most impressive buildings in China. There was also a preserved group of houses and gardens where the powerful Kong family lived and governed the region for much of its history. Stone tablets on the temple grounds traced the family tree of Confucius, and his descendants still keep track of the link to their famous ancestor. Our tour guide at the temple claimed to be part of the 76th generation of Kongs since Confucius.
After spending the day in Qufu, we retraced our path back to Tai’an. This was a minor victory for us because we made the trip to and from Qufu, each way using a motorcycle taxi, two buses, and a bit of walking. All without a map or the ability to speak English to anyone along the way. We even got back to Tai’an in time for dinner. No McDonalds this time though, we had some real Chinese food instead. One of the food vendors on the street looked like they were selling sticks of various grilled meats. We pulled up a stool and were handed a box of hot coals and a plate full of raw bits of food, some of which looked and tasted a bit weird. At the end of the meal we had the owner write down what we ate and had it translated back at the hotel. The results came back and said that we had mutton, cartilage (yep, it was crunchy), and “heart tubes”. At least we had the good sense to wash it all down with a beer named after the mountain we climbed the day before. I’m pretty sure it is still made of barley and hops.