Where are you going this summer? The scenic area is crowded with people, the temperature in many places is not high, and the air tickets are getting more and more expensive...

Until I accidentally saw a travel promotional poster, Beijing to Datong, 100 minutes by high-speed train? ? ?

Quickly check the ticket, sure enough: Beijing North - Datong South, the high-speed rail takes 1 hour and 46 minutes, and the fare is only more than 100 yuan.

Datong is a historical city that has been lying on my travel wish list, so it is so close to me?

So what are you waiting for, let's go!

【Overview of Datong】

Datong, Shanxi, one of China's top ten ancient capitals;

It is located in the northernmost part of Shanxi Province, at the junction of the three provinces of Shanxi, Hebei and Mongolia.

Once the capital of the Northern Wei Dynasty, the accompanying capital of the Liao and Jin Dynasties, and an important town in the Ming and Qing Dynasties;

A strategically important place that military strategists must contend for in ancient times;

The place where the Han nationality and the minority nationalities merged...

【schedule】

Day1: Datong Ancient City - Night tour of the ancient city

Day2: Hanging Temple - Mount Heng - Yunhai Quyi Society

Day3: Datong Museum - Huayan Temple - Nine Dragon Wall - Night tour Daiwangfu

Day4: Yungang Grottoes - Return

【first day】

Arrived in Datong in the afternoon, the weather was a mess. The sun was shining brightly, and the blue sky was as clear as washed water. Before that, I always thought that the sky in Datong was gray. After all, it is the largest coal producer in the country. The driver proudly told me: That is all in the past tense, don't you know the current "Datong Blue"?

After arriving, go to the hotel to check in - Hampton by Hilton Datong.

The hotel is very new, and the room facilities are also very smart. The price is three or four hundred, and I personally feel that the price/performance ratio is quite high.

Although the location is in the new district, the surrounding area is very convenient, and it is not far from various attractions in the city.


Put down your luggage and decide to go around the ancient city first.

Datong Ancient City

As the historical ancient capital of "three generations of capital, two dynasties", the ancient city of Datong is of course a must-visit place.

Datong Ancient City is located in the Pingcheng District of Datong City. There are no tickets and you can enter and exit at will. According to historical records, the existing ancient city walls of Datong were built on the basis of the old earthen cities of the Northern Wei, Tang, Liao, Jin and Yuan Dynasties. What we see now was restored after Datong implemented the ancient city protection project in 2008.

The ancient city wall is 14 meters high, and it neatly and systematically surrounds the ancient city of 3.28 square kilometers into a rectangle. The Huayan Temple, Fahua Temple, Shanhua Temple, Bell Tower, Drum Tower, Sipailou and other ancient buildings that we are familiar with are all among them. It can be described as a few steps and a scene, dizzying. If friends who like ancient architecture come, they may not be able to finish reading after a week.

Climb up the ancient city wall and look at the inside of the ancient city, which has a special charm.

The city wall is 7.24 kilometers long for one week, and there are no tickets for it. In addition to walking, you can also rent bicycles.

Looking at the sunset and sunset, shining on the ridge tiles of the eaves, I can't help but sigh: Who said that the years can't be kept?

Night tour of the ancient city

At eight o'clock in the evening, lights were lit outside the city wall, and it was another scene. The colorful light shines on the city wall, the music fountain dances smartly, and the crowds are surging.

Datong at night is not only full of vitality but also cool and refreshing. Who would have thought that in this hot summer season, the night in Datong is only a dozen degrees, and it even feels a little cool.


【the next day】

I got up early today because I was going to Hengshan and Xuankong Temple, the journey takes about an hour and a half.

Although the Hanging Temple is a part of Beiyue Hengshan, it is a scenic spot of its own. In other words, the two scenic spots are separated and entered separately. After calculating the time, we were quite nervous in the morning and had more free time in the afternoon, so we decided to go to Xuankong Temple first.

Hanging Temple

In other words, the purpose of my coming to Datong, Xuankong Temple can be ranked in the top three. Before I became a travel blogger, I saw a photo on the Internet: there is a temple hanging on the cliff with no foothold. It's like vines growing on the mountain wall, mysterious and sacred. That photo shocked me for a long time, and it was also one of the motivations for me to go out and see the world. It is the Hanging Temple located in Hunyuan County, Datong.

The Hanging Temple was built more than 1,500 years ago, and it is the earliest and best-preserved high-altitude wooden cliff building in China. Xuankong Temple has three major features: strange, hanging and ingenious.

Strange: The whole body of the Xuankong Temple is suspended in the middle of the stone cliff, with a protruding peak on the upper part, which protects the ancient temple from rain; The unique site selection is one of the important reasons for its well-preserved condition.

Xuan: Seen from a distance, the Xuankong Temple is supported by more than a dozen thick wooden pillars erected outside. You can walk into it and observe carefully, and find that they are not stressed. The real center of gravity is supported in the hard rock, and the half-inserted flying beam is used as the base based on the principle of mechanics. The load-bearing is the horizontal wooden column deep into the rock wall.

Ingenious: Adapt measures to local conditions, make use of the natural state of layout, and express the plane layout of general temples in three-dimensional space. There are mountain gates, bell and drum towers, main halls, side halls, and statues.

There are two tickets to enter the Xuankong Temple: the admission ticket and the Xuankong Temple boarding ticket. Tourists with high blood pressure, heart disease, and fear of heights are not suitable to go up, just buy a park ticket, which is quite humane.

Don’t be sad if you can’t visit the park. The entrance ticket can also see the whole picture of the Xuankong Temple. You can also take a photo with the temple at the bottom, and the trip is worthwhile.

If you buy a boarding ticket, you can enter the Xuankong Temple to watch. The aisle of the Hanging Temple is narrow, so there is only one fixed route for visiting, one-way tour, and you can't go back. When there are many tourists, there will be a limited flow, so you must follow the guidance of the staff.

The highest "Three Religions Hall", the originator of the three religions (Sakyamuni, Laozi, Confucius) lives in one hall, and the Hanging Temple is also the only unique ancient building in China that combines the three religions of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism.

Lunch

After leaving the Xuankong Temple, lunch will be settled in Hunyuan County. Caijia Restaurant, which started in the 30th year of Guangxu, is also a well-known local time-honored restaurant.


Hunyuan jelly is a local specialty, refreshing and appetizing in summer.

Bibimbap, whose name I don't remember, has been well received by everyone. The fat and thin braised pork is spread on the rice, and the waiter stirs it with a large spoon. The oily rice with the aroma of gravy makes people salivate.

Beiyue Hengshan

With enough food and drink, I gathered enough energy to climb Mount Heng. Mount Heng, one of the Five Sacred Mountains. The main peak, Tianfengling, is 2016.1 meters above sea level. It is the throat of the plateau outside the Great Wall leading to the Jizhong Plain. Tang Jiadao once wrote a poem "there are five mountains in the world, Hengyue lives in the north, and there are thousands of rocks and mountains, strange and unpredictable."


There are several ways to climb Mount Heng, and we naturally chose the easiest way, taking the cable car. But even if you take the cable car up the mountain, the journey is not easy at all. After getting off the cable car and looking up, there is still a long way to the top of the mountain.


Fortunately, the road up the mountain is shaded by big trees. The weather in Datong is again: as long as it is not in direct sunlight, it is very cool. So this journey, although exhausting, will not be very hard.


The route set in the scenic area is also very reasonable, one-way passage, no turning back, and not easy to get lost.

In addition to seeing the scenery on Mount Heng, there are also many ancient temples and shrines. In ancient times, there was a saying of "three temples, four temples, nine pavilions, seven palaces, eight caves and twelve temples".

The main hall of Hengzong, which overlooks the southern sky, has a towering negative cliff; the sleeping hall of Beiyue, which is hidden in a secluded place, is embedded in a grotto;

At least half a day should be reserved for the tour of Beiyue Hengshan. Dress as lightly as possible, especially with a pair of non-slip heel shoes. There is a 60° steep step road, but I climbed up with hands and feet.

Yunhai Quyi Club

When we returned to downtown Datong at night, we were not idle. After all, Datong has such a rich nightlife. In other words, what is the experience of a Tianjin native listening to cross talk in Datong? As a Tianjin girl who grew up listening to cross talk, listening to cross talk in a foreign land is also quite intimate.

Not only cross talk, but also Datong Shulaibao, an ancient RAP from the East, hahahahaha. At first I couldn't understand it, but after listening carefully, the more I listened, the more interesting it became. It was humorous and rhymed, which was quite touching.

[the third day]

Today's itinerary is all in the urban area, especially the several points in the ancient city, which are very close, so the arrangements are full.

It is said that "if you want to understand the city, go to the museum", so let's go to the Datong Museum as the first stop today.

Datong Museum

The appearance of the Datong Museum is very distinctive. The whole shape looks like a crater and the structure of Yungang Grottoes. Circling and flying, it shows the Datong of Dragon City.

Museum tickets are free, but you need to make an appointment online in advance, and then swipe your ID card to enter. When visiting a museum, you must listen to the explanation, otherwise it will be in vain. You can rent an interpreter on the first floor of the museum, but I recommend hiring an interpreter, which will be more lively and interesting.

The Datong Museum is a national first-class museum with rich collections, and the collections from the Northern Wei Dynasty and the Liao and Jin Dynasties are classics.


Among the precious cultural relics, some impressed me deeply, such as:

The lacquer screen with painted characters and stories of the Northern Wei Dynasty unearthed from Sima Jinlong's tomb is included in the list of cultural relics prohibited from going abroad (territory) by the country;

The Yuan Dynasty Yingqing Glazed Guanghan Palace Porcelain Pillow unearthed in Wulidian is the "treasure of the town hall" in the Datong City Museum.

238 statues of pottery figurines unearthed from the tomb of Sima Jinlong form the "Terracotta Warriors Array", which is the largest array of figurines in the Northern Wei Dynasty so far in China.

The cultural and creative peripherals of the Datong Museum are also doing well, especially my favorite chapter booklet. A museum can stamp 48 chapters, covering almost all the scenic spots in Datong.

Lunch

I have a feeling when eating in Datong these days: Even if it is a well-known time-honored brand, even if it is located in a tourist area, the price is still very close to the people.

Today's lunch is arranged at Longjuxiang Shaomai Restaurant next to the Drum Tower. It is said that this is a time-honored restaurant with a history of more than 600 years.

Although it is a siu mai restaurant, the slogan in the store is good: not only is the siu mai delicious.

Sure enough, I ordered a few more snacks with the same name, yellow rice cold cake, cold day lily, rabbit head, oil cake, all of which did not upset me.

Huayan Temple

There are many ancient temples in Datong. After repeated decisions, we decided to follow in the footsteps of Mr. Liang Sicheng and went to the first stop of his research on ancient buildings in Datong: Huayan Temple.

Huayan Temple, located in the southwest corner of the ancient city of Datong, was built in the seventh year of Liao Chongxi (AD 1038) and named after the Buddhist classic "Huayan Sutra". It is the largest extant Liaojin temple complex in China.

Unlike the tradition of Han temples facing south from north, Huayan Temple faces east from west.

This is related to the religious belief and living customs of the Khitan people who established the Liao Dynasty "believing in ghosts and worshiping the sun". The Khitan people are nomadic people and regard the sun as their god. In their eyes, grasslands, flowers, cattle and sheep are all given by the sun, and they have to worship the sun every morning. Tents, houses, and palaces are all built facing east, and temples are no exception.

️——Daxiong Palace

The brightly colored and resplendent Daxiong Palace was founded in the Liao Dynasty and rebuilt in the Jin Dynasty. The glazed kiss on the main ridge is as high as 4.5 meters. It is the largest glazed kiss in ancient Chinese architecture. Among them, the north kiss is the original Jin Dynasty, and the south kiss is made in the Ming Dynasty.

——The Bhagavan Tibetan Hall

The ancient and majestic Bhagat Temple was founded in the seventh year of Liao Chongxi (1038). It is a hall dedicated to storing Buddhist scriptures. It is also the oldest hall of Huayan Temple and the most complete and oldest Buddhist temple in China. The algae wells, wall collections and statues in the hall are all original from the Liao Dynasty.

There are 29 painted sculptures from the Liao Dynasty intact in the Bhagavan Tibetan Hall. Among them, the most classic one is a Bodhisattva with folded palms and bared teeth. The Bodhisattva smiles slightly, showing white teeth; Known as the "Oriental Venus".

The double-floor-style carved wooden scripture pavilion in the hall was built in the style of the imaginary Tiangong, which is quite exquisite. It is the only large-scale wall collection production in China, and is praised by architect Liang Sicheng as "the only one in China".

️—— Huayan Tower

The Huayan pagoda has a gold plate on the top and a lotus pond on the bottom; it has three floors and four eaves, and each floor is three rooms wide and deep. In particular, the 500-square-meter Thousand-Buddha Underground Palace under the pagoda is made of 100 tons of pure copper, and contains Buddha relics and thousands of Buddha statues.


Nine Dragon Wall

It is hard to imagine that the largest existing dragon wall in China with the earliest construction period is not in the Forbidden City or Beijing, but in Datong. Datong Nine-Dragon Wall is the screen wall in front of the royal palace at that time. The Nine Dragon Wall faces south, 45.5 meters wide, 8 meters high, and 2.02 meters thick. The nine flying dragons are majestic.

The whole wall is made of 426 glazed components, and there is a reflecting pool in front of the wall. It's a pity that when we went, the reflection pool was being repaired, and we couldn't see the scene of "Kowloon swimming in the water with its head held high".


Night tour of Daiwangfu

Opposite the Nine Dragon Wall is Daiwangfu. Daiwang Mansion was originally the mansion of Zhu Gui, the thirteenth son of Zhu Yuanzhang, and it was also a relatively large-scale vassal mansion in the Ming Dynasty, with more than 20 palaces and more than 800 rooms. However, the original building has been damaged, and what we see now is the restored Daiwang Mansion.

Visiting Daiwangfu at night is much more interesting than visiting during the day. For example, to participate in the "Happy Event on behalf of the Prince's Mansion"? This is a wedding banquet in the palace of the Ming Dynasty. Hundreds of professional actors shuttled among the crowd, with a huge guard of honor, dancing and music playing in unison, full of brilliance.

The large-scale costume song and dance performance includes three links: "Welcome guests on behalf of the prince's mansion", "Heir's wedding" and "Canonization Ceremony". You can also enjoy Jin Opera, Beilu Bangzi, and Huahaier, the three major intangible cultural heritage dramas.

In addition, you can also participate in interactive sessions such as the princess recruiting a son-in-law to have an immersive experience.

dinner

How can you come to Shanxi without eating noodles? Not far from Daiwangfu, there is a well-known local noodle shop called "Xijindao". When we went, it was past nine o'clock, and there were still people queuing up at the door.

The menu is very simple, noodles/snacks/cold dishes, but the taste is not simple. Sliced ​​noodles, the noodles are firm enough, with bite and wheat fragrance, and the amount of beef is soft and rotten. A bowl of more than 30 yuan is really worth it.

[the fourth day]

The last stop in Datong is also the most important stop of our trip - Yungang Grottoes.

When you come to Datong, how can you not go to Yungang Grottoes? As a world cultural heritage, the Yungang Grottoes are not only the pride of Datong, but also the pride of Chinese civilization.

The Yungang Grottoes were excavated on the mountain, stretching for one kilometer from east to west, with 254 small and large caves and 45 main caves. It is the largest group of ancient grottoes in China. Together with Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, Longmen Grottoes in Luoyang and Maijishan Grottoes in Tianshui, they are also known as the "Four Great Grottoes in China".

After buying tickets to enter the scenic spot, we will first pass through the long corridor, followed by a group of grand buildings, here is the mountain hall and water hall restored according to historical records. Show us the beautiful scenery that we have missed in a way of restoring the old.

Then, we entered the real Yungang Grottoes. From the outside, there are large and small holes dug in a piece of yellow mountain. I just think it's mediocre? Occasionally, some statues that are exposed outside are also dilapidated due to years of damage.

Don't worry, let's go further in. When you see the eaves of the wooden cave, you will start to be overwhelmed and amazed when you go in. The colorful statues that have gone through many dynasties are rushing towards us. They are exquisite, lifelike, novel and colorful... It is not enough to describe its beauty. The four sides of the grotto, the top of the head, and wherever the eye can see are covered with colorful statues.


We can learn about the Yungang Grottoes in chronological order.

Early Grottoes: Caves 16-20, also known as "Tan Yao Five Caves". During the period of Emperor Wencheng, the eminent monk Tan Yao presided over the excavation. A large Buddha in each cave symbolizes the five emperors of the Northern Wei Dynasty who "has descended from Taizu".

Mid-term Grottoes: There are mainly Caves 1 and 2, Caves 5-13 and the unfinished Cave 3. It was the heyday of Yungang Grottoes before Emperor Xiaowen ascended the throne and moved the capital to Luoyang. At this time, most of them are prosperous and exquisite big cave statues, which are famous for their exquisite carving, complexity and grandeur, and are called "Taihe style".

Late Grottoes: Caves 21-45, and the small niches on the cliff west of Caves 4, 14, 15 and 11. There are more than 200 small and medium-sized caves. After the Northern Wei Dynasty moved the capital to Luoyang, large-scale royal excavation projects stopped, but the trend of digging caves and statues spread among the people. The "Sinicization" reform was carried out in the late Northern Wei Dynasty. Buddha statues and Bodhisattvas have thin faces, long necks, narrow and sloping shoulders, and are elegant and refined. This is also the origin of the "thin and clean statues" of grotto art.

It is particularly worth noting that in order to protect cultural relics, photography is not allowed in the cave. Therefore, I can't show you the exquisite statue murals in the cave. In fact, no matter how superb your photography skills are, nothing compares to what you see with your own eyes. So if there is a chance, I really hope that everyone can experience the visual impact of "one thousand years at a glance, and the wind and clouds are turbulent".

【Conclusion】

The tour of Yungang Grottoes is over, and our trip is approaching the end.

Before going to Datong, I only thought it was a famous historical city, and even guessed: there should be nothing to see and do except ancient buildings, right? But when I really came to Datong, I found that it not only has the depth of history, but also has modern trends and vitality.

The sky in Datong is "Datong blue", the summer in Datong is cool, and the night in Datong is neon flashing...

No longer learn about the world from other people's mouths, no longer rely on guesswork to try to figure out a place, this is the meaning of travel.

Come to Datong: discover Datong, make a big difference.