Yunyang Mountain 云阳山

About Yunyang Mountain

The forest park covers 8,688.7 hectares on the near edge of the county town, bordered by the Mi River, the Liling-Chaling railway and National Highway 106, and is formed from several summits including Yunyang Shan itself, Tiantang Shan, Yangliu Shan and Yingzuiyan; the ground ranges from 110 metres to 963.2 metres. The provincial forestry bureau describes the wider Yunyang Shan scenic area as 8,941.4 hectares and lists five designations for it at once: national 4A tourist area, national urban forest park, provincial scenic area, provincial nature reserve and provincial geopark. The mountain is conventionally described as having seventy-two peaks, ten notable rock formations, ten gorges and dozens of karst caves, with 25 natural and 13 cultural features catalogued inside the park.

Its historical claim rests on a title it lost. Local gazetteer material records that in the early Tang, Yunyang was first designated the Southern Marchmount, but that after the official Liu Yan reported the Mi River too rapid for reliable approach the designation was transferred to Mount Heng, leaving Yunyang Shan with the epithet 'ancient Nanyue'. Religious activity on the mountain is traced to the Northern and Southern Dynasties, and over more than 1,500 years the temples Yunyangxian, Chisongxian and Ziyunxian were established. A local custom holds that the Sage Emperor of the Southern Marchmount passes the sixth and seventh lunar months at Yunyangxian, summed up in the saying that one worships at Yunyang in those months and at Mount Heng in the eighth. The mountain also carries strong Yandi Shennong and tea associations: Lu Yu's Classic of Tea records Yunyang Shan as the tea mountain named for the tea growing in its hills and valleys, and the Hunan Provincial Forestry Bureau describes Chaling as the only administrative county in China named after tea.

What to look for

• Yunyangxian, originally Yunyangshan Temple founded in the Tang Kaiyuan era and renamed in the Qing, now a Daoist temple dedicated to the Sage Emperor of the Southern Marchmount
• Guanyinyan, a steep rock grotto at Yunyangxian with a Guanyin figure set against the cave wall
• Zhangliang Shijianyan, a large rock split by a single straight cleft, behind the Wulei Pool
• The sites linked to Yandi Shennong's herb work, among them Qifengtai, Xiyaochi and Shaiyaoping
• The Nanyue Palace and Ziyun Temple halls, restored and extended by the county from 2008 onwards

Location & getting there

Getting to Yunyang Mountain

Check weather, trail access and the last return service. A mountain or forest area is not one entrance, and a map’s central pin may be far from the trailhead.

• Search for 云阳山 with 株洲市 and 茶陵县.