Temples and forests...

We explored two temples at the base of Emeishan, the Baoguo Temple and the Fuhu Temple, dating back to the 16th century. One statue (the one pictures below of Buddha sitting on top of a 3-tusked elephant) even dates back to 1415. The sites were peaceful and lovely, surrounded by lush forests and gorgeous flowers.

Magical Mount Emei...

For 2 days, we hiked on Emeishan, climbing up 3000 metres and staying the night at Elephant Bathing Pool Monastery along the way. It was a wonderful, peaceful and tough climb, with a total of 35 kilometres and thousands upon thousands of stone steps (and only one sketchy temporary wooden path over a steep drop-off - a bit nerve-wracking in retrospect). The Golden Summit, with its beautiful statues and golden temple, and snowy peaks in the distance, was stunning.

A 1200-year-old 71-metre tall Buddha at Le Shan

On our way to Emeishan, we stopped for the day at Le Shan to explore the site of the Big Buddha and a temple built at the same time, 1200 years ago. Of course, we continued to eat amazing food as we made our way out of town.

Mount Qingcheng and Dujiangyang

We happened to visit Mount Qingcheng and Dujiangyang, just outside of Chengdu, on a Chinese holiday. This meant both sites were very busy. However, the mountain was beautiful and Dujiangyang was extensive and impressive, the site of a 2300-year-old irrigation project that included dykes, dams and channels to get water through the mountain. Pretty amazing without modern machinery and techniques.