Nanshan Scenic Area 南山旅游区

About Nanshan Scenic Area

Provincial and municipal descriptions divide the site into three parts: the Religious and Historical Culture Park, the Happy Valley theme park and the East Sea Tourism Resort, the last with twenty kilometres of coastline. The area is rated a national 5A scenic area, a national forest park, a provincial tourism resort and a national industrial and agricultural tourism demonstration site. Within the culture park, Nanshan Chan Temple, Xiangshui Nunnery, the Nanshan Daoist Court and Lingyuan Temple are described as remains of the Jin and Tang periods, and a historical culture garden is laid out dynasty by dynasty. Happy Valley, which holds Nanshan Courtyard, an equestrian club, a pet park, the Happy, Guanyin and Bodhi islands, a tropical plant garden and a waterfall square, opened to visitors in May 2010.

The best-known feature is the Nanshan Great Buddha, a seated figure cast in tin bronze and weighing about 380 tonnes, which provincial and municipal pages call the largest of its kind in the world. Longkou's city government describes it as cast in sections and welded together from 642 tin-bronze pieces, comprising 232 body components, 108 lotus petals and 302 hair curls, over a steel frame of more than 120 tonnes; the ensemble measures 102 metres from ground level to the top of the head, and a stairway of 360 steps rising 58.66 metres leads to the pedestal. Beneath the lotus seat is a three-storey structure 18.8 metres high and 8,900 square metres in area holding the Merit Hall, the Ten Thousand Buddhas Hall and a museum of Buddhist culture and art. The figure sits in the full lotus posture. A second highlight is the Nanshan Medicine Buddha, a jade image 13.66 metres high and weighing 660 tonnes, described as the largest indoor jade Buddha in China, and the Huayan World complex with its Five Buddhas hall, musical fountain and prayer-wheel corridor was completed in September 2009.

What to look for

• The Nanshan Great Buddha, a seated tin-bronze figure of about 380 tonnes assembled from 642 cast pieces
• The Merit Hall, Ten Thousand Buddhas Hall and Buddhist culture and art museum inside the three-storey base beneath the lotus seat
• The Nanshan Medicine Buddha, a jade image 13.66 metres high and 660 tonnes in weight
• Nanshan Chan Temple, Xiangshui Nunnery, the Nanshan Daoist Court and Lingyuan Temple, described as Jin and Tang foundations
• The Huayan World complex completed in September 2009, with its Five Buddhas hall and prayer-wheel corridor

Location & getting there

Getting to Nanshan Scenic Area

Check which interiors and courtyards are accessible. Active places of worship and protected monuments may have different visitor rules.

• Search for 南山旅游区 with 烟台市 and 龙口市.