Fellow Virtual Travelers and Historians,
The last time you heard from us, we were in Shanghai. Since then, we flew to Xi'an where a guide met us. After 2 hour van ride, we arrived at Huayin City at the base of Huashan. We stay here until October 23rd.
An hour after arriving at our hotel, we video taped an interview with Abbot Yu, at the active Taoist Temple located near the base of Hua mountain. The interview lasted an hour, as Master Karl read pre-written questions to our English-speaking guide, who translated them to the Abbot.
We learned a lot from his answers - it cleared up some questions in our minds about the martial arts history at Huashan! This trip is only a scouting mission for Huashan and we'll need to return for a longer period of time, before writing about its myths, legends and folklore!
Today is October 21st and yesterday we spent much of our time on the West and South Peaks of Huashan:
http://wikitravel.org/en/Huashan_National_Park
http://www.chinahighlights.com/travelguide/china-hiking/huashan-hiking.htm
http://wiki.china.org.cn/wiki/index.php/Mount_Huashan
Since our last visit to Huashan, they've built a new cable car system that takes you right to the top of West Peak, which saved us an enormous amount of hiking time. Our two interests on this peak were the Lao Tzu's Furnace and the Planked Walk.
While the weather was beautiful with unusually blue skies, the winds across the top of the peaks caused the planked walk to be closed. So we got to see where the plank path starts, but did not get to 'walk the plank' as we'd hoped. Weather permitting we'll try that assault again before we leave.
None of us are as sore from our hiking, as we thought we might be. Here's to 10,000 steps straight up!
Today it rained (as we'd expected from both the frontal system that caused the wind yesterday, as well as weather forecasts). We successfully accomplished some trip logistics by finding a bank to change more money and we got some laundry turned in. This afternoon, Dennis and Master Karl explored the West Jade Temple (dedicated to Emperor Xi Yue) here in town, while Anita caught up on log book entries and email communications from the hotel.
The legend of the Chess Pavilion will be a chapter in the 'Hua Mountain Odysseys' book and an overview of this legend is in our '10,000 Steps Straight Up' book, on page 118. The legend details how ownership of Hua Mountain came to be held by the Taoists.
Thank you to everyone we've heard from! We eagerly read your emails, but our internet connections here at Huayin has not been very reliable, so we have given up trying to respond!
Craggy peaks of Huashan
The Chess Pavilion
The Plank Walk Entrance
Blessings,
Dennis & Anita