The Abyss

In my last post I talked about the beautiful mountains in Zhangjiajie National Forest Park...and the horrifying stairs that has left me emotionally scarred for life.  But before Liv and I ever even reached those majestic, stair ridden, peaks, we did a little exploring of the mountains just on the outskirts of Zhangjiajie City.

The city itself features an easily accessible mountain of its own--Tianmenshan.  We also wanted to see this mountain as part of our summer epic.  It is actually the first thing we saw upon entering the city, as it is much closer to the city than the National Forest Park--this is a bus trip that takes a couple of hours whereas Tianmenshan is a taxi ride and cable car away from our hostel.  

Left is the beginning of our cable car adventure...little did we know, center and right are some shots while on the cable car. 

The cable car is very cool because it is so long.  It starts in the middle of the city and goes into the mountains!  We were on that cable car for close to 30 minutes--and we decided to go in the morning...when it was nice and misty.  Basically, once we reached a certain altitude, you couldn't see anything--just the cables disappearing into the mist and the occasional empty cable car coming back down in the opposite direction.   If Zhangjiajie National Forest Park was characterized by stairs, then I would have to say this trip was typified by the swirling mist, or the abyss as we frequently refer to complete foggy cover we encountered on this mountain. We captured our reaction to the encroaching clouds while on the cable car on film in the videos below.  I apologize in advance for the increasingly higher pitched panic evidenced in our voices.

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Tianmenshan was different from our experience in Zhanjiajie as it was much more misty than the mountains in the park.   It was also filled with considerably less stairs (not counting the last part of our day, which I will get to later).  So we walked along pathways and looked out over a landscape that was continually changing as the clouds drifted in and out, alternately hiding and revealing mountains.   I really liked this mountain; it was quiet, the whole atmosphere relatively hushed, and since we were in the mountains and the sun was hidden by all that mist, the considerable cooler temperatures were very much welcome; this region of China is pretty hot in the summer.

Some really pretty misty mountains!

Misty Mountains Majesty? 

To the left is me being an asshole--the mist was really freaking Liv out, so that was my response. To the center and right are more misty pictures--can't get enough of those!

Another nifty feature of this mountain is the glass walkway.  For ten extra yuan you can walk on a pathway that has quadruple plated Plexiglas, allowing you a view straight down the mountainside.   Once the vertigo wears off, and the terror of walking on glass thousands and thousands of feet up in the air, you realize this is super cool.  Although, I will say that having to put cloth booties over your shoes, to make sure your shoes don't crack the glass, remains terrifying the whole 10 minutes you are on that walkway.

In addition to this glass staircase was this suspension bridge you could go on, which connected two parts of the misty mountains.  It wiggled when you jumped on it, which of course, we did jump on it.  It also disappeared into the mist, so that you could not see the other side.  We caught some of it on tape; unfortunately the wind started to change and the mist started to clear a bit towards the end of the video.

Tianmenshan was really cool because of all this fog or mist or clouds or whatever the heck it is...atmosphere?  It was neat, because the clouds kept shifting, so even if you stayed in the same spot for five or ten minutes, you still had a different view.

Some more lovely misty mountains. 

Before returning back to Zhangjiajie City, there is one more part of this mountain to see, and that is the Ladder of Heaven.  I should have seen this feature of this mountain as a ominous portent of our immediate future, but alas, I ignored the signs.  The Ladder of Heaven is not, strictly speaking, a ladder at all (false advertisement much?!) but rather, as so many things in China seem to be, a giant staircase.  To get to this staircase from the top of the mountain, you take the cable car down to a half way point.  You then take this completely insane road to get the ladder.  I mean, it's the twisty-est most insane road I have ever seen, and the drivers whip around them like they are driving in NASCAR.  To make matters even more reassuring, there are these giant mirrors posted at the turns, so that our drivers can see oncoming racing enthusiasts from the other direction.  Occasionally, on the more tricky turns, our driver would lean on the horn...you know, to warn whoever might be hurdling at us from around the bend they we moments away from imminent death.

I thought I got a better picture of the winding roads, but this the only think I could find (left) (see link above for someone else's picture of that crazy road!), and some shots of our bus (center, right).  We went through tunnels! They were not big enough for two buses, but no big deal. 

Once you arrive at the Ladder of Heaven, you only really have two options: climb that staircase or get back on that bus and go back to the cable car.  We thought, well heck, lets climb it, we're here, aren't we?  Trust me, given what I was about to live through tomorrow, I kind wish we'd just turned around and got back on the roller coaster bus.  However, the view at the top was pretty cool; more swirly misty mountains, which in all honesty, are kind of hard to get tired of.

Left: That there hole is the  mountain would be the ladder of heaven, the center is a nice view of those stairs, and then over to right is a pretty good facial representation about our feelings about those stairs. 

But you once you reach the top of that darn ladder, you feel such a sense of accomplishment (center), and complete dominion over nature (right).

Last but not least I want to leave you with a video of swirly misty mountains, just in case you want to see more of the abyss...erm, totally lovely, and not at all creepy misty mountains.