Dear friends:
Mount Hua is located in the qinling mountain range, which lies in southernshaanxi province.
Mount Hua (hua means brilliant, chinese, or flowery; shan means mountain)is one of the five sacred taoist mountains in china. Mount Hua boasts a lot ofreligious sites: taoist temples, pavilions, and engraved scriptures arescattered over the mountain.
Mount Hua is well-known for its sheer cliffs and plunging ravines. it isknown as “the most precipitous mountain under heaven” and is probably the mostdangerous mountain in the world frequented by hikers.
Mount Hua is located 120 kilometers east of xi'an, about 3 hours from thecity centre. there are five peaks that make up the mountain: cloud terrace peak(north peak, 1613m)， jade maiden peak (middle peak, 2042m)， sunrise peak (eastpeak, 2100m)， lotus peak (west peak, 2038m) and landing wild goose peak (southpeak, 2160m). north peak, the lowest of the five, is the starting point. it hasthree ways up it: the six kilometer winding track from Mount Hua village, thecable car or the path beneath it.
next on the route is jade maiden peak. legend has it that a jade maiden wasonce seen riding a white horse among the mountains, hence the name. the hikerscan choose to take a left to sunrise peak, a fine place to enjoy the view of thesunrise in early morning (which would involve climbing the mountain in the darkas there is nowhere to stay on the mountain).
alternatively visitors could take a right to lotus peak. Mount Hua meansflower mountain, and it got the name from lotus peak, which resembles abeautifully blooming lotus flower. finally there is a gondola which taksvisitors acroa steep valley to landing wild goose peak, the highest among thefive summits. the path to the summit is characterized by steep rock faces, withobstacles including a foot-wide plank walkway fixed to a sheer rock face withonly a chain along the rock for support. the route continues with footholds inthe rock and a chain for holding. this is followed by a vertical ladder in acleft in the rock. finally there are steep stone steps. the south peak is notfor the faint of heart and is particularly dangerous in winter weather. however,the views are breathtaking. the climb to its summit makes it clear how theimpenetrable mountain repelled attackers over the centuries.
as early as the second century bce, there was a daoist temple known as theshrine of the western peak located at its base. daoists believed that in themountain lives a god of the underworld. the temple at the foot of the mountainwas often used for spirits mediums to contact the god and his underlings. unliketaishan,which became a popular place of pilgrimage, Mount Hua only receivedlocal pilgrms, and was not well known in much of the rest of china. Mount Huawas also an important place for immortality seekers, as powerful drugs werereputed to be found there. kou qianzhi (365-448)， the founder of the northerncelestial masters received revelations there, as did chen tuan (920-989)， wholived on the mountain prior to receiving immortality. in the 1230s, all thetemples on the mountain came under control of the daoist quanzhen school. in1998, the management committee of Mount Hua agreed to turn over most of themountain's temples to the china daoist association. this was done to helpprotect the environment, as the presence of monks and nuns deters poachers andloggers.