Longmen Grottoes, Shaolin / Flying Monks. Optional: Spring Temple Buddha (largest statue), Guoliang Tunnel.
Outdoor mountain show staged in Daixian Gorge of Songshan, ~7 km southeast of Shaolin Temple in Dengfeng, Henan. 75-min performance combines Zen music, kung fu by ~600 monks, and dance.
Shaolin Temple show, Henan. Pair with Luoyang.
Spring Temple Buddha, Henan. Detour from Luoyang.
1.2 km road tunnel hand-carved through the cliffs of the Taihang Mountains in Huixian, Henan. Dug by 13 villagers from Guoliang Village between 1972 and its opening on 1 May 1977 to connect their isolated settlement.
Cliff-cut road, Henan. Could detour from Luoyang (5h).
Sacred mountain near Huayin in Shaanxi, ~120 km east of Xi'an. Famous for treacherous trails including the cliffside Plank Walk along near-vertical rock. Nicknamed No.1 Steepest Mountain Under Heaven.
Plank walks of death. Near Xi'an, off your route.
One of China's largest natural salt lakes; one of three major sodium-sulphate inland salt lakes in the world. Southwestern Shanxi. Salt harvested for ~6,000 years. Summer algal blooms turn water vivid technicolor — Dead Sea of China.
Yuncheng, Shanxi. Could combine with Pingyao.
Village in Linying County, Luohe, Henan. Widely described as China's last Maoist-style collective. Reverted in 1984 to communal ownership of land, agriculture, and industry. 30% cash + 70% public services. Statues of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Mao stand prominently.
Last Maoist commune, Henan. Curio.
Funerary sculptures of Qin Shi Huang's army, Lintong District, Xi'an. Buried with the first emperor of China. UNESCO.
Xi'an. World icon. Significant detour from your route — 4-5h HSR from Luoyang.
Bozhou, Anhui. World's largest TCM market.
Historic hot-spring complex at the northern foot of Mount Li, ~25 km east of Xi'an, Shaanxi. Three millennia of imperial use (Zhou, Qin, Han, Tang). Tang romance of Emperor Xuanzong and Yang Guifei. Site of the 1936 Xi'an Incident.
Xi'an imperial baths.
72,000-hectare Y-shaped valley system in Jiuzhaigou County, Aba Tibetan-Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, northern Sichuan. Multi-coloured lakes, multi-level waterfalls, forests. UNESCO (1992); admission timed and capped at 41,000 per day.
Multi-colored lakes. October peak foliage. Far but world-class.
High-altitude valley in northern Sichuan famous for terraced calcite travertine pools, waterfalls, hot springs and snow-capped peaks. UNESCO World Heritage Site (1992).
Huanglong, Sichuan. Stunning but distant.
Reputed world's largest ginkgo tree, in Longnan, Gansu. ~30 m tall, ~15 m combined trunk girth. Hollow interior >10 m^2 — a local farmer once sheltered with his cattle inside it.
Li Jiawan ginkgo — peak gold ~mid-Nov, just barely past your trip window.
Tianshui. Spectacular but off route.
Lhasa — major detour, Tibet permits required.
Rongbuk, Tibet. Permits required.
