Travel Notes | Climbing Mount Tai

Sometimes, I like to "take quotes out of context", no, I just like this feeling: Qilu is still young, with clouds growing in his chest, and he will be at the top of the mountain, and he can see all the mountains and small mountains. I think this is enough, the distance, the momentum, the sea of ​​clouds, and the mood are all there. Unfortunately, I have never been to Mount Tai. When I arrived in Jinan more than 20 years ago, I had no time. Later, when I came to Shandong again, I only had so much time. Year after year passed.
In March this year, I went to Qingdao for a business trip, scheduled before the weekend. I told my colleagues that I was going to take a detour to Qufu and Tai'an to see the Confucius Temple and Mount Tai. My colleague is fatter, not very interested in traveling, and has a little difficulty climbing mountains. On the 18th, after visiting the Confucius Temple together, he said he wanted to go to Jinan to meet his children, and then go to Beijing to do other things.
Another friend who likes mountain climbing knew about my plan to climb Mount Tai in advance and asked me if I could go together and have a companion with the same interests. That would naturally be a happy thing. Because the Tai'an high-speed railway station square was under construction and was quite chaotic, the train didn't arrive at the station until 10 o'clock in the evening, so I ran to pick him up.
There are several routes to climb Mount Tai. We chose the traditional middle route, from Hongmen via Zhongtianmen to Nantianmen. I arrived in Tai'an earlier and lived not far from Dai Temple. I wanted to go Turn around, but a few long phone calls completely wiped out this plan. We really wanted to see the sunrise on Mount Tai, and we had enough time, so we arranged a two-day climbing plan, so we could take our time.
It was after 8:30 in the morning on the 19th that we set off from where we were staying. The haze was a bit heavy and Mount Tai disappeared from our sight. The sun was very strong, and we had to take off our thick clothes after a while. The light was still a bit dazzling, which was a bit inconsistent with this season, which was supposed to be cold and cold in spring.
Along Hongmen Road, passing Daizongfang, we quickly arrived at the Hongmen ticket office. There were many tourists, but it was not overcrowded. One day at the gate, there were many people taking photos in front of the archway where Confucius ascended. As a quick-sighted person, I tried hard for a long time but could not take a photo that showed the whole picture. Either one thing was blocked or another was blocked.
The place where Confucius ascended is a stone square with four pillars and three doors. It is elegant and dignified with ancient vines, but at this time all the leaves of the vines have withered. I originally thought that the boarding point was at a very high place, but I didn’t expect it to be so low. Secondly, I never thought that the road here is so narrow, and there is a ticket inspection office not far ahead, which made it a bit awkward and not smooth at all. quick.

After checking in at the gate at the base of Wanxian Tower, you enter the scenic spot. The stone road is neat and lush, with tall pines and cypresses on both sides. Unfortunately, there is almost no trace of water in the stream in the valley. There is a monument to revolutionary martyrs on the right side of the road, with an inscription engraved on the base. Except for my friend and I, we walked over and paid our respects. No one else came during the time I was there.
There are many stone carvings on both sides of the road, not far apart. It can be said that there are stones everywhere. It seems that many of them were only carved in recent years. Most of them are some caves, heavens and paradise, and I don't think they are very meaningful. Suddenly I found a small stone. The deeply polished surface was engraved with the word "二 insects" (the top of the insect still had a stroke). A young mother was taking pictures with her children. I asked my friend how to interpret this stone carving. , my friend said that he didn’t know, and asked me if I didn’t know either. I thought he was joking and didn’t want to respond. Later, I found out that he really didn’t know, so he said that this stone carving was interpreted as “Boundless Wind and Moon”, which was written in ancient times. From left to right, if read directly, it should be "Chong Er". Remove the outer frame of the traditional Chinese "风月". Isn't it just these two words? Chinese literati like to play a little bit These little clever things. After hearing what I said, several tourists hurriedly ran out to take photos. Fortunately, I took the photo in advance, otherwise I would have to wait again.

Continuing forward, there is an archway in front of me that says "Doumu Palace". When I walked over, I asked my friend to turn around and found that the words had changed to "Doumu Palace". In ancient times, "Doumu Palace" had the same meaning in many places, which is a symbol of An honorific title for an older lady. The main hall in the courtyard of Doumu Palace was originally dedicated to the Goddess Doumu, commonly known as the Buddha with Thousand Arms and Thousand Eyes. It is also the common name of Bixia Yuanjun, whose full name is "Celestial Fairy and Jade Girl Bixia Yuanjun". In front of the temple, the staff of the scenic area set up a desk and a place for offering incense. I don’t know how other people felt. I was a little disgusted.

Before Sanguan Temple, there are more steps, and the difference in physical fitness of tourists is obvious at a glance. On the base of Hutian Pavilion, above and to the left and right of the doorway, there is a big cypress tree breaking out of the wall, twisting upward, which is very majestic and majestic. Hutian Pavilion was built in the Ming Dynasty. It was originally called Shengxian Pavilion. It was renamed after expansion in the twelfth year of Qianlong's reign in the Qing Dynasty (1747). It got its name because Taoists called the fairyland "Hutian". During the Jiaqing period of the Qing Dynasty, Cui Yingchen wrote a couplet: "The sun and moon in the pot sky open up the spiritual realm, and the wind and clouds on the winding road enter the green sky." During the Jiaqing period of the Qing Dynasty, Tinglu, the magistrate of Tai'an, wrote a couplet on the pavilion: "Halfway up this mountain is already Hutian, creating a thousand-fold and blessed land."
Not far from Hutian Pavilion is Huimaling. When you climb here, the mountain is steep and the roads are winding, making it impossible for horses to continue moving forward, hence the name. The road here becomes steeper, and there are many more tourists than before, both going up and down the mountain. Among the bustling crowd, there was a middle-aged man with leg and foot problems, struggling up the mountain on the steps with crutches. He seemed to be more relaxed and stable than others around him, and I admired him very much.
Following the flow of people, we arrived at Zhongtianmen unknowingly. The terrain here is relatively flat, with toilets and other public facilities. It is accessible by a winding mountain road and is also where the lower station of the Zhongtianmen Cableway is located. Zhongtianmen is also known as Ertianmen. The soil here is yellow and red. It is named Huangxian Ridge and is the birthplace of Zhongxi. There is a Zhongtianmen stone square on the top of the ridge. It is said that there are many tigers in Mount Tai, so the ancients built two tiger temples in the east of the square to worship the black tiger god to suppress the mountain beasts. The back hall was destroyed. In 1972, the small temple was demolished and a cloister-style kiosk was expanded. In 1989, the name of the Erhu Temple was restored. It has a statue of Marshal Zhao Gong, the God of Wealth, holding an iron whip and standing astride a black tiger, and painted murals.

As the Zhongtian Gate continues upward, there are more stone carvings along the way, densely covered on the rocks, especially the "rat-shaped stele" under the Yunbu Bridge. There has always been endless controversy. I have seen some introductions in other places. So far. At that time, I completely forgot about it. After watching it with my friends for a long time, I felt that the image was more like a fox than a mouse. If it were to be interpreted as a character, the head (left side) looks like the character "山", and the whole body looks like the character "山". When interpreting the word "ru", I interpret it as "rushan". Overall, I interpret it as "rufu". Fuhu has the same pronunciation, and Bo smiles. It doesn't matter whether it's right or wrong.
Yunbu Bridge is a single-hole arched stone bridge built across the Zhongxi River. There are often clouds filling the bridge, and the pedestrian bridge looks like it is in the sky, hence the name "Yunbu Bridge". There are large steep stone cliffs in the north of the bridge, covered with inscriptions, and waterfalls falling straight down. The scenery is superb. It is a natural place for tourists to stop and take a rest. We also took a rest here. There are more than 50 inscriptions on the cliff, such as "Red Bridge Flying Waterfall", "Lin Yu Common Life", "Heshan Yuanmai", "Taikou Qingyin" etc., each in genuine, cursive, official script and seal script. , a dazzling array of things to see. At the head of the bridge is a stone sculpture built in the Qing Dynasty Waterfall Pavilion, also known as Zuoquan Pavilion. The inside and outside are full of couplets and poems. Visitors can appreciate the great Chinese spirit from these stone carvings. Sublimate the spiritual world.

After passing Wudafu Pine, there was a temple next to it. The plaque read "Dongyue Temple". It was still early, so we rested for a long time at Dongyue Temple. Under several pine trees in front of the temple, there were many such blessing plaques. I quite like it, squatting down and experiencing the state of mind of the person who listed it. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older. I was not interested in these things before, but in the past two years, I have become more aware of them.

At the Five Doctor Pines, I was still counting the five pine trees one by one. It turned out that a maximum of 4 pine trees met the "requirements." I came back to check the information and found that this was not the case at all. It is said that Qin Shihuang ascended Mount Tai to seal the throne. Encountering rain on the way, he took shelter under a big tree. Because the big tree served as a protector, he awarded the tree the title of "Five Doctors". Who knows that later generations mistakenly called it "Five Doctors". During the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the ancient pine trees were destroyed by thunderstorms. During the Yongzheng period of the Qing Dynasty, when the imperial envoy Ding Zaobao was ordered to rebuild Mount Tai, he replanted five pine trees. Two of them are now alive, with curved branches and vigorous and ancient shapes. Haha, it turned out to be completely wrong.

There is a pine tree on the west slope of Dongyue Temple, called the Welcoming Pine, which is very similar to the Welcoming Pine in Huangshan Mountain. There were several children playing there, carefree, and the only one affected was me. I wanted to take a "clean" photo, but after waiting for a long time, there was no one, and I couldn't bear to call the carefree children away. .

After passing the Wanzhang Monument, we entered the Shibapan, which is the most dangerous section of the Mount Tai mountain climbing route. There are 1827 stone steps in total. It is one of the main symbols of Mount Tai. It is as if a piece of the cliffs of the two mountains has been cut off. , steep winding roads embedded in it, looking from a distance, it looks like a ladder to the Tianmen. In the past, I had read some literary works and great people’s use of climbing eighteen sets to overcome difficulties. I imagined that this would be difficult. Later in Huashan, I walked through the West Peak several times, and the steep mountain ridges on the propaganda posters were nothing more than that. I have also considered whether the eighteen games will be the same. After twelve minutes of preparation, plus I had recorded the elevation of Mount Tai by 300 meters, on the continuous steps, I felt that I had reached Nantianmen before I even exerted my strength. I smiled and said to my friend, "That's it." Come up like this? Really boring!

Mount Taishan Nantianmen, also known as Santianmen, is located at the end of Shibapan, the top of the mountaineering winding road, and is located on the mountain pass between Feilongyan and Xiangfengling. Looking up from below, it looks like a palace in the sky, the gateway to the top of Mount Tai. Founded in 1264, it was renovated many times during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, and twice after the founding of the People's Republic of China. The architecture now maintains the style of the Qing Dynasty.

Regardless of the famous mountains in China or the unscripted hills, most of them have Nantianmen, and some have other Tianmen. In fact, this comes from Chinese mythology. In mythology, Nantianmen is the entrance to the human world and the divine world. In mythology, because Most of the stories that happen are related to the human world, so Nantianmen is the most popular one. If you go to the west, that is the territory of Buddhism. To the north is Buzhou Mountain, where the Tianzhu is. Back then, Gonggong was so angry that he touched Buzhou Mountain and collapsed the sky, which led to the story of Nuwa patching up the sky. To the east If so, that is the fairy island, where the scattered immortals live. According to the Book of Mountains and Seas, it turns out that those fairy islands were carried by giant turtles. A certain giant country caught a few turtles, so two of them sank, and two of them were still there. The remaining one is called Penglai, and the Giant Kingdom offended the Emperor of Heaven because of this matter, and was punished to shrink his body to the size of a human. Haha, so that’s it.

I thought the top of the mountain was very narrow, but when I passed through the Nantian Gate, my view suddenly opened up. Various buildings were built along the mountain, including hotels, temples, and more shops, one after another. Before we went up the mountain, we had already booked a hotel. There were many people in Tianjie and it was bustling, so we decided to find a hotel first and rest for a while before going out. The hotel is located at the Sun View Peak. I asked several people and took a long detour from Tianjie, Bixia Temple, and Zhanlu Terrace. I walked a lot more and found out the locations of the main attractions.
There were more and denser stone carvings on the top of the mountain, and it felt a bit overwhelming. After resting in the hotel for more than an hour, I called up my friends in the next room and went to the top of Mount Tai for a walk. There were more people at this time, and the stone carving of the Five Sacred Mountains was so crowded, and the size of the monument was far smaller than I imagined. There is a mountain peak on the north side. The mountains and forests there are also very quiet, so I and my friends decided to go there after coming out of the Gudeng Fengtai at the top.
After passing Zhangren Peak and exiting Beitianmen, there were many stones on the top of the archway of Beitianmen. We laughed and threw them up. It must have been thrown by tourists, but they all fell down. Come down. Moving forward, passed through a forest and came to the top of a small mountain. The road was blocked by falling rocks, forming a cave that required bending to pass . There was a sign on the road in front of the cave. , It is said that this is Yaoding, the place where Yao worshiped heaven. There is a piece of flat land on the top, with a big Tai Chi diagram on it. There is a cliff on the edge of the cliff. As far as the eye can see, all the mountains are small.

When we walked back, it was almost dusk. We strolled slowly on the path, enjoying the leisurely comfort. We placed one or two exploded pine cones on the stone steps, and we seemed to have become many years younger...

Back to Nantianmen again, and then to Tianjie. The dusk has become thick, so it is not suitable to take pictures. The light rain in Tianjie is as moist as crisp, and the color of grass is not visible from a distance. There is no rain in Tianjie now, and there is no grass. There is only a slight There are bright lights and a completely relaxed mood. Tai'an City under the mountain is ablaze with lights.
I entered the hotel and made an appointment with my friend. If there was sunrise tomorrow, I would call him. If there was no sunrise, he would sleep in. I said no problem. If the door is broken and he can’t wake up the next day, don’t blame me. .

It was still very cold on Mount Taishan in late March. The sewer pipes in the room were still frozen and could not be used. Instead, they left some odor in the house. I had to go to the public restroom above the counter to wash up. I simply used cold water. I washed my feet. The platform is the highest point nearby. Except for the north side which is blocked by a house, the other three sides are open. We plan to take photos of the sunrise here early the next morning.
It was getting bright, so I got up and walked around, and found that below the skyline, the smog was very serious and dark. I thought there would be no sunrise, so I went back to the room and got under the quilt in despair. After being confused for a while, I was unwilling to accept it and opened the curtains of the room. Haha, the sun was rising outside the window, but the haze was too heavy, which was far from what I wanted. Later, I asked a friend if he had seen the sunrise. He said that he also saw it from the window and thought I was deliberately letting him sleep a little longer. Unexpectedly, I saw it the same way.

By the time we walked out of the room, the sun had risen very high and there were already many tourists outside. We first went to Zhanlu Terrace in the south and entered through a round gate in the wall. For convenience, we climbed onto the platform from a path. Zhanlu Terrace is steep on three sides and the walls are as sharp as a knife. It reminds me of the Sheshen Cliff in Nanwutai, but it is far less steep than the Sheshen Cliff in Nanwutai. Legend has it that in the old days, people often came to Mount Tai to pray for the gods to save their parents from illness, and jumped off the cliff here to express their love. Later, the government built walls and railings on the side of the cliff, and changed "Sacrifice Cliff" to "Love Body Cliff" to advise people to Cherish life.
Zhanlu Terrace is the place where Confucius visited the State of Lu. On the stone there are inscriptions such as "The Bell of Good Fortune is Beautiful" by Zhao Puchu and "Yan Hengyun Leaning on the Clouds" by Zhou Erfu. To the northeast of the stone there is a flat boulder facing the cliff, called Kezhi Terrace, on which there is an inscription from the Zhenghe period of the Song Dynasty. If the weather is clear, you can indeed overlook the mountains and rivers of Lu from a distance. Unfortunately, the haze is severe today, and all the fields and cities at the foot of the mountain have disappeared. Confucius, who climbed Mount Tai and became a small Lu, if he had arrived here at this time, I don’t know what would happen. Thoughts.

After returning from Zhanlu Terrace, I checked out of the hotel and prepared to take a zigzag tour to the top of the mountain. Then I descended the mountain from the Taohuayuan Cableway and caught the train back to Xi'an.
There were a lot fewer tourists than the previous afternoon, but you still have to be quick and quick to take pictures of all the stone carvings, because everyone likes to run up to the monument and take photos with it. When other friends were taking photos, I was choosing angles, but I couldn't find the feeling that the Five Sacred Monument had on TV, especially due to the interference of various railings at the back.

Along the path at the top of Mount Tai, we meandered down the mountain to the west. The path was relatively narrow and steep. There were many stone carvings on the cliffs. We stopped and walked and enjoyed the stone carving culture leisurely. It was very relaxing, especially We discussed how to interpret "Yan Er" for a long time, and finally decided that because the short horizontal line is at the bottom, the "二" should be interpreted as "下", but this seems to be missing somewhat unreasonably. It suddenly occurred to me that writing like this can also be interpreted as " Same as above ", then this stone carving should be interpreted as "Yanyan", Yanyan means tall and towering, the Book of Songs says " "Taishan Yanyan, Lu Bangzhan" is its annotation, right .

After walking for a while, I discovered that there was a hotel in front of me, so I turned back and went down to the foot of Daguan Peak. Daguan Peak was cut off the cliff into a monument, covered with stone inscriptions from past dynasties. Its momentum made me very excited. I was a little confused and didn’t know what I was looking at. I just stood there in a daze. My friend asked me what was wrong. Then I came back to my senses and looked around the entire cliff. Finally, I settled on "Ji Taishan Inscription" The inscription is . "Ji Taishan Inscription" was written by Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty when he ascended Mount Tai in the 13th year of Kaiyuan (725). It is commonly known as "Tang Moya". The cliff is 1320 cm high and 530 cm wide. It has 24 lines of official script inscriptions and a full line of 51 characters. There are 1008 characters in existence. The characters are 16×25 cm in size. The inscription on the forehead is "Ji Taishan Inscription" with 4 characters in 2 lines and 45 characters in size. ×56 cm, style of calligraphy is Tang Li. The diction is elegant and the calligraphy is vigorous, quite in the style of the prosperous Tang Dynasty. There were fewer tourists at this time. After we woke up, we quickly asked our friends to take pictures in front of the cliff. After we finished taking pictures, the surrounding tourists also joined in taking pictures.

When passing by Bixia Temple, I asked my friend if he wanted to go and pay homage. My friend was not very interested either. I walked out of the gate and down the steps. There was a road on the right, and the sign was leading to "Confucius Temple". I don't know why. Since we all chose not to go, I have forgotten it even now, because it is not my traveling style not to go to this place. The haze is slowly dissipating, and the blue sky should soon come down. There are many people in Tianjie, many of whom came up this morning. From their chats, I learned that there were many people gathered before the gate of the scenic spot opened. Many tourists originally thought that they would be the first to come in as soon as the gate of the scenic spot opened. There would definitely be fewer people and they could easily climb the mountain. It seemed wrong, but fortunately they did not implement it.

When we came down from the mountain, there was not even a trace of cloud in the blue sky. It was about 8 kilometers from the gate of the scenic spot. We decided to go out. The spring was warm, the willows were first green, and the flowers were in bloom. We took a stroll and chatted with each other. Wouldn't it be nice to laugh for a while?

Among the five mountains, Mount Tai is not the highest mountain, the largest mountain, nor the most beautiful mountain, let alone in a larger area, but Mount Tai is the most 'weighty' mountain and cannot be crossed. Because it has the sustenance of Chinese culture.
"Looking up makes you taller, digging into it makes you stronger, you can say that it is superior; it is beyond its kind, it is outstanding, it is as if it is natural."