The Hanging Temple
Clinging to the side of a sheer cliff face in a gorge some 80km southwest of Datong, the Hanging Temple is one of the most visually arresting sights in all China. It’s not, however, an attraction for those nervous of heights – literally translating as “Temple Suspended in the Void”, its buildings are anchored by wooden beams set into the rock.
There’s been a temple on this site since the Northern Wei, though the buildings were periodically destroyed by the flooding of the Heng River (now no longer there, thanks to a dam upstream), occasioning the temple to be rebuilt higher and higher each time. Your first glimpse of it will be spectacular enough, but things get a great deal more atmospheric once you’re inside the rickety, claustrophobic structure. Tall, narrow stairs and plank walkways connect the six halls – natural caves and ledges with wooden facades – in which shrines exist to Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, all of whose major figures are represented in nearly eighty statues in the complex, made from bronze, iron and stone.
The Wood Pagoda
At the centre of the small town of YINGXIAN (应县, yìngxiàn), 75km south of Datong, the stately Wood Pagoda, built in 1056 in the Liao dynasty, is one of the oldest wooden buildings in China, a masterful piece of structural engineering that looks solid enough to stand here for another millennium – however, it’s not possible to ascend. During a recent renovation, a cache of treasures was found buried underneath the pagoda, including Buddhist sutras printed using woodblocks dating back to the Liao.
Dougongs
The ceilings and walls of the Wood Pagoda’s spacious internal halls are networks of beams held together with huge, intricate wooden brackets, called dougongs, of which there are nearly sixty different kinds. Interlocking, with their ends carved into curves and layered one on top of another, these give the pagoda a burly, muscular appearance, and as structural supports they perform their function brilliantly – the building has survived seven earthquakes.
Wutai Shan
One of China’s four Buddhist mountains, the five flat peaks of Wutai Shan – the name means “Five-terrace Mountain” – rise around 3000m in the northeastern corner of Shanxi province, near the border with Hebei. Its main base, the village of Taihuai, lies on a backroads route linking Datong and Taiyuan, and it’s possible to access the mountains from either of those cities. The long bus ride here is rewarded with fresh air, superb scenery, some fascinating temple architecture and a spiritual (if not always peaceful) tone. Though increasingly accessible, many of Wutai Shan’s forty temples have survived the centuries intact and remain functioning, full of resident clergy.
Despite a surprising number of ordinary Chinese people here as pilgrims – thumbing rosaries and prostrating themselves on their knees as they clamber up the temples’ steep staircases – it has to be said that intense summertime tourism at Wutai Shan can put paid to feelings of remoteness, and might make you regret the effort taken to reach here. Crowds fade away between October and April, though during this period you will have to come prepared for some low temperatures and possible blizzards. Note that all temples are open daily from sunrise to sunset.
Off the trail in Wutai Shan
There’s some decent hiking in the area south of Taihuai; whatever the time of year, don’t head off into the hills without some warm, weatherproof gear, food and water, and a torch, even though in good weather the trails here present no special difficulties. Allow plenty of time for hikes, as the paths are hard to find in the dark and even in summer the temperature drops sharply at sundown.
Yungang Caves
Just 16km west of Datong, the monumental Yungang Caves, a set of Buddhist grottoes carved into the side of a sandstone cliff, are a must. Built around 400 AD at a time of religious revival, the caves were the first and grandest of the three major Buddhist grottoes, the other two being the Longmen Caves in Luoyang and the Mogao Caves in Gansu. These are the best preserved, but prepare to be disappointed by their surroundings – the atmosphere has for years been blighted by nearby coal mines, and the benefits afforded by the recent addition of parkland have been eroded by a huge and even more recently built shopping mall. However, it’s still well worth the trip.