Dadu River Jinkou Grand Canyon 大渡河金口大峡谷

About Dadu River Jinkou Grand Canyon

The Dadu River rises at the Bayan Har Mountains and takes its name after its upper branches meet at Danba; the canyon's valley floor is generally 70-200 m wide (locally under 50 m), with a shoulder width up to about 8 km. The canyon exit's lowest elevation is about 580 m, while Dawashan on the north bank reaches 3,222 m, giving a maximum canyon depth over 2,600 m. The geologist You Lianyuan, quoted by the magazine, describes its geology, built on the ancient 'Kangdian Axis' structure with exposed Archean metamorphic rock and later magmatic intrusions, as resembling a natural geological museum; in a separate comment the geologist Fan Xiao describes the Dadu River as crossing its last threshold at Dawashan here before entering the Sichuan Basin.

Its position on a zone of intense crustal uplift, at an area of extreme elevation change on China's topographic steps, with hard, horizontally bedded dolomitic limestone bedrock, make it, per the magazine, the most typical example in China of a steep-walled gorge and narrow defile on a major river: vertical valley walls, a deep narrow floor almost entirely occupied by the riverbed, and tributary side-canyons forming extremely narrow, sheer-walled 'one-line-sky' gorges. Along the river run the Jinwu Highway and the Chengdu-Kunming Railway; on the mountainside winds the Lexi Highway, built during the Second World War.

At about 2,000 m elevation on Dawashan, above the canyon's north bank, the Jinkouhe district government's page describes a band of five pools locally known as the 'Five-Colored Celestial Ponds', in a wetland-rich area it calls a well-preserved natural ecology museum; the page reports that an American explorer, identified as Beiber, called the mountain 'the most magical natural park in the world' after climbing it.

What to look for

• the canyon's steep-walled gorge sections, with valley floors as narrow as 50 meters and depths over 2,600 meters
• the 'one-line-sky' tributary side-canyons branching off the main gorge
• the Chengdu-Kunming Railway and Jinwu Highway running alongside the river through the canyon
• Dawashan's 'Five-Colored Celestial Ponds', a band of five pools at about 2,000 meters elevation

Location & getting there

Getting to Dadu River Jinkou Grand Canyon

Confirm the visitor entrance and which boat or walking routes operate on your date. Rainfall, water levels and weather can change access.

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