After leaving the Purple Heaven Palace Temple, I wandered down to the bus stop. There was a cute Pekinese dog there who wagged his tail at me. He did growl when I tried to pet him. I assume he has a very happy life for a dog in China. Must be one of the nun's dog.
I was alone on the bus to the "trail head"where you actually begin the long climb to the golden summit.
I took a couple of detours on my way. First I went to a side temple where there is a statue of Zhenwu and LaoTsu. Below is a painting from the Lao Tsu temple.
Many pilgrims tie red ribbons with prayers on them to trees along the pilgrimage route. They are weighted down with stones.
Some of these ribbons were on the tops of trees, hanging off the edges of cliffs. Some pretty crafty people somehow put some ribbons on branches of extremely tall trees in extremely difficult to reach places. I have no idea how. In some of the extreme cases it defies physics.
The path is stone hewn, but in many places very steep. There appear to be older steps on some parts of the path. Some of the steps appear to be of a green stone, making the steps, in effect, resemble a jade staircase. In taoist lore, immortals ascend a jade stair to achieve immortality.
As you walk the path, you come upon a number of caves with shrines inside. At one cave temple, I had a brief chat with a priest who was there doing his rituals. This is one such cave shrine.
This one was near the shrine to the taoist thunder god. I wanted to take his picture, but I definitely do not want to piss off a sky god.
As I walked the path, the misty wetness made the steps very slippery. Leaving the temple of LaoTsu, I slid down about 5 steps. I felt that this was a sort of warning by the local spirits to mind my step. I easily could have broken my neck along the path, which actually was so icy that I could sort of skate along the path without lifting my feet.
On one treacherous stretch, a man who I believe to be a taoist priest took my hand and gently led me down the steps. I told him "wo de pong yo" which means, "you are my friend" he laughed and said yes I am. : )
I got past a stretch of rather icy areas. At one point I literally was taking each step, one at a time. There was no one else walking the path with me.
As I came down a flight of stairs, there was a spider web, hanging from above and attached to the railing
Along the strand of fine spiders silk hung four or five beads of ice, like tiny diamonds. It made me stop in my tracks for a moment. I was enthralled by the delicate beauty of something so fragile, hanging there on a breath, the water coming from the mist and freezing there on the most minute of fibers. Waiting for an eye to glimpse its delicate perfection.
More to come, in Wudang Shan part 3
I was alone on the bus to the "trail head"where you actually begin the long climb to the golden summit.
I took a couple of detours on my way. First I went to a side temple where there is a statue of Zhenwu and LaoTsu. Below is a painting from the Lao Tsu temple.
Many pilgrims tie red ribbons with prayers on them to trees along the pilgrimage route. They are weighted down with stones.
Some of these ribbons were on the tops of trees, hanging off the edges of cliffs. Some pretty crafty people somehow put some ribbons on branches of extremely tall trees in extremely difficult to reach places. I have no idea how. In some of the extreme cases it defies physics.
The path is stone hewn, but in many places very steep. There appear to be older steps on some parts of the path. Some of the steps appear to be of a green stone, making the steps, in effect, resemble a jade staircase. In taoist lore, immortals ascend a jade stair to achieve immortality.
As you walk the path, you come upon a number of caves with shrines inside. At one cave temple, I had a brief chat with a priest who was there doing his rituals. This is one such cave shrine.
This one was near the shrine to the taoist thunder god. I wanted to take his picture, but I definitely do not want to piss off a sky god.
As I walked the path, the misty wetness made the steps very slippery. Leaving the temple of LaoTsu, I slid down about 5 steps. I felt that this was a sort of warning by the local spirits to mind my step. I easily could have broken my neck along the path, which actually was so icy that I could sort of skate along the path without lifting my feet.
On one treacherous stretch, a man who I believe to be a taoist priest took my hand and gently led me down the steps. I told him "wo de pong yo" which means, "you are my friend" he laughed and said yes I am. : )
I got past a stretch of rather icy areas. At one point I literally was taking each step, one at a time. There was no one else walking the path with me.
As I came down a flight of stairs, there was a spider web, hanging from above and attached to the railing
Along the strand of fine spiders silk hung four or five beads of ice, like tiny diamonds. It made me stop in my tracks for a moment. I was enthralled by the delicate beauty of something so fragile, hanging there on a breath, the water coming from the mist and freezing there on the most minute of fibers. Waiting for an eye to glimpse its delicate perfection.
More to come, in Wudang Shan part 3
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