Strolling through the First Palace and admiring the millennium old trees
Climbing Mount Taishan in rainy days is a unique experience
The day before, I went to bed early, and the next day at around 6 o’clock, I tidied up. After checking out, I kept it in the hotel and took a hiking stick to have breakfast across the street. I packed two baskets of buns and the leftover stir fried chicken from last night. After walking for ten minutes, I arrived at the Dai Temple, but it hadn’t opened yet. As soon as it opened at 8 o’clock, I went in to stroll. The Dai Temple is said to be the first palace in Mount Taishan Mountain, where ancient emperors would stop and hold ceremonies when they came to Mount Taishan Mountain to offer sacrifices. Behind the main hall, there is a back sleeping hall for the emperors and concubines to live. In addition, the temple has the largest number of stone tablets and ancient trees, mainly Han cypresses. There are two ancient tree courtyards, Tang Huai and Han cypress, on the left and right sides of the temple. There are five Han cypresses planted by Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty in the garden. It is 2100 years ago. The tree trunks are black, gray, ferocious, twisted, but still some new branches are green (I forgot to take photos).
One cannot help but think of the teacher’s poem “Spring Snow in Qinyuan”: “There are so many beautiful mountains and rivers, which have attracted countless heroes to compete and bow. I cherish the Qin Emperor and Han Wu, who are slightly inferior in literary talent; Tang Zong and Song Zu, who are slightly inferior in charm. A generation of heavenly pride, Genghis Khan, only knows how to bow and shoot big eagles. They have all gone, counting the wind and flowing figures, and looking at the present dynasty.” A tree has traveled for thousands of years, a mountain has traveled for billions of years, and many people have come to worship and see it, but it is truly famous.
After a quick tour of the Dai Temple for taking pictures, we took a taxi to Tianwai Village at the foot of Mount Taishan Mountain, where we lined up to take a bus up the mountain. At this time, it began to rain, and visibility became worse and worse as the altitude rose. When we got off the Zhongtianmen Gate, everything we saw was like a fairyland of white fog. We took a break and began to climb with the crowd.
The process of climbing the mountain was pure, only because the rain gradually increased and my vision was severely obstructed. There was not much place to rest along the way, so I had to rely on a hiking stick to climb up. Moreover, the rain made it wet and cold, and stopping to rest was even colder. The raincoat I was wearing was almost soaked halfway through, and putting on the leftover raincoat I used at the Dragon Palace yesterday was basically useless. Along the way, I couldn’t see much scenery, so I had to lower my head and count the steps step by step to climb up.
In less than three hours, we arrived at Nantianmen. At this time, the rain was too heavy, and the body was really wet and cold to shiver. I asked to have a bowl of Mount Taishan unique instant noodles to warm up with some hot soup. Uncle instant noodles had an excellent geographical location, which was both warm and restrained. He said that one bowl of hot water would be more than one bowl of hot water. The four of us ate Xiaolongbao and yesterday’s fried chicken with instant noodles, and recovered most of our strength and temperature. Then we started walking up the sky street, but the rain was too heavy. We had no choice but to buy a new raincoat to continue walking. With the new raincoat, we could protect ourselves from the wind and rain. Plus, after eating, we didn’t feel so cold anymore. We wanted to take in the small mountains, but due to the heavy clouds, rain, and fog, it felt like we were really in a fairyland in the sky, watching a few figures in a hazy way.
Or the heavy rain made us feel very embarrassed, and we hardly saw the magnificent scenery on the mountain. We only saw various inscriptions on the mountain walls, and literati left their own writings. We also left a shadow in front of various inscriptions, and then quickly climbed to the top before leaving.
We returned to Nantianmen and prepared to take the cableway. Fortunately, the cableway had been renovated and began operating on the same day. We then descended the mountain to Zhongtianmen and traveled through the sea of clouds along the way. After a gust of wind blew, the opposite mountain was finally revealed. In a few seconds, the sea of clouds covered us again. After buying souvenirs along the way, we took a bus down the mountain.
At the foot of the mountain, the sky was almost completely dark, and we took a taxi back to the hotel, which was also very congested. After changing into dry clothes with our luggage, we followed the plan and took a taxi directly to the next city – Qufu. According to the plan, we had to press our feet in Qufu first to relieve the fatigue of climbing during the day, but it was too late on the way. When we arrived near the Confucian Temple, it was already past 8 pm. We chose a Confucian restaurant to eat and then walked back to the hotel to rest.
