Mount Wuyi

The WHS boundary of Mount Wuyi includes the west most part of Jiangxi province and the northwest part of Fujian province. As a mixed site, Mount Wuyi is famous for both its natural beauty and historic value. 

The natural part of Mount Wuyi, of course deserves its inscription as a natural heritage. The whole area is in Danxia landform (regions with cliffs and red stones formed with the force of water), similar to all the locations inscribed in another world natural heritage site "China Danxia". Inside the Mount Wuyi Scenic Area, there are three most famous peaks that are inscribed: Tianyou ("wandering in the heaven") Peak, Yu'nü ("jade lady", used to describe beautiful young female) Peak and Dawang ("the king") Peak. You could easily access all the three peaks by the shuttle bus (70 RMB per person per day), and hike both Tianyou Peak and Dawang Peak. Yu'nü Peak, however, is almost impossible to hike but is the most iconic site inside the national park. It is said that the peak obtained its name because of the similarity of its shape with young female, however I could not identify any resemblance. Besides the mountains, the Jiuqu Stream is also inscribed into the natural part. One could easily take a bamboo raft to raft along the stream (a total time of about 1 hour and 20 minutes). During the raft, you could see all three peaks, as well as the Boat Coffins hanging on the cliffs and the Cliff Rock …

The WHS of Mount Wuyi has not been covered well by reviews yet - at least I think they do not do justice to the complexity of this mixed WHS. After reading beforehand about what to see and do in the area I decided to spend more than one day here and explore various parts.

On my arrival day, I moved straight to the second location called “Ruin of Han Dynasty City”. This lies some 15km outside of the Wuyi scenic area. From Nanpingshi railway station (formerly known as Wuyishan East) I took the recently installed tramway and got off at Chengcun, from where it’s a 3km walk to the ruins (it’s signposted and you can use the bike path). It’s a location of interest in the inscription history of this WHS, as ICOMOS in 1999 actually considered it a separate site and thought it would be better to split this cultural archeological site from the more nature-focused main site.

The split didn’t happen though and now the Han City Ruins are part of the Wuyi WHS, and they proudly display the WH logo everywhere. Strangely, access regulations are different between the two locations – while the main site requires quite costly one or multiple-day passes, the entrance here is free. The ruins lie in a sleepy village and at the sites (I went to the museum and the palace ruins) no one else was around except for one person at each reception. The museum is quite a …

I visited Wuyi Shan in Feb. 2017 on a weekend I had spare, being in Fujian Province on business at the time and this being one of the reachable UNESCO sites from where I was based.

The two main activities are floating along the river on a raft (accompanied by what I assume was some sort of running commentary, tea and music) as well as rambling across the mountainous terrain which features many tea plantations - some of which were purportedly slated for imperial use due to their specific geographic location and thus I assume climate / sun / shade / soil / overall quality.

There is also a temple and a cave which you will come across, with all the major sights being serviced by regular shuttle-buses. A one-day tour ticket was Y150 at the time.

I'm not sure I'd go out of my way to travel here if I weren't already nearby for other reasons, but it did give me a chance to stretch my legs and get some fresh air away from industrial cities and I did want to share a few photos given that there have yet to be any published.

AW

05 Mar. 2018

Mt Wuyi is one of the best places to visit if you want to get away from the busy similar places such as Mount Longhu where you get to see the same rock-graves and formations, a trip down the lake on a raft and it comes with an "Impressions Wuyishan" as you might have seen in Lijiang, West Lake or Haikou. Worth a visit for the evening as there is not much else to do after dark aside from eating. There are not many foreign tourists here but busloads of Chinese tourists which means they amass at the bus stations but won't venture too far into the walking area.

Let's get started with the mountain. There are 2 areas to visit and the main spots are connected with a free shuttle bus if you bought the entrance ticket which is valid for several entrance gates so you don't have to visit all in one day. You are recommended to take one day for the northern part alone as there is a lot to see and gently hike, and then finish off with the raft trip. The next day should go to the southern area. Doing all in one day is possible but a bit tight especially as you need to time the rafting when you buy the ticket. There are not many steps up and down and the term mountain is misleading in this case. There are many rocks around you and once in a while you will have a …