Eight Days Tour in Guizhou (Zhaoxing-Tongren)

Day1 Shanghai-Guilin-Zhaoxing

Arrival at Guilin airport, picked up by your guide and driver, move to Zhaoxing, the biggest Dong village in Guizhou province. It takes 2.5 hours to drive from Guilin airport to Zhaoxing.

Or you can arrive at Congjiang Train station by bullet train from Guilin or Guangzhou.

Overnight in Zhaoxing

Day2 Zhaoxing(Zhaoxing Biasha-Zhanli-Huanggang-Zhaoxing)

Today we visit one Miao village Basha and other 2 Dong villages:

Zhanli and Huanggang

After breakfast, you’ll start an exciting exploration for a visit to Biasha Miao Village with 84 kilometers’ drive from Rongjiang to Congjiang. Biasha Miao Village is called as “the Last Gunner Village in China”. This is the only place in China where residents are still legally allowed to own and carry guns. The Biasha people are said to be the descendants of Chi You, a mythological warrior in ancient China, and have traditions dating back 2000 years. Men of Biasha dress as ancient warriors with black waistcoats and straight black trousers as well as swords, hunting dogs, and firelocks. Women of Biasha wear black pair shirts and pleated skirts, which are simple but embroidered with bright colors. Once getting into the village, you will witness the welcome ceremony - Biasha men line up and fire 3 shots to welcome guests! Later, enjoy the folk performance to learn more about Biasha culture, including customs of farming, hunting, ancestor-worshiping, gaming and marriage. You can even watch an amazing haircut ritual - a live shave with a sickle. If you have more time, you can take a walk around this beautiful village.

In this afternoon, drive to Zhanli Dong Village to listen to the mysterious legend with “one boy and one girl” tradition. Ancestors of Zhanli made a rule during the early Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) to achieve balance between the population and the amount of cultivated land. According to the legend, there is a herbalist in the village who uses the mythical herbs to control the population. Before couples try to have a second child, they come to the herbalist. She will take water out of one of two wells - a “boy well” and a “girl well” - and brews a soup with a local herb with it. By drinking the mixture, the couple can allegedly decide the sex of their next baby. This happens real in the village, and most of families in Zhanli have two children, with 98% having one girl and one boy. Take a simple walk along the brook and view the boy well and girl well here.

Next, head to Huanggang Dong Village, a village considered as one of the most beautiful and traditional Dong villages in Guizhou. Huanggang, hidden in the mountains, built in ancient Song Dynasty (960-1297), has preserved the most authentic Dong culture. The villagers have had simple and unsophisticated ethnic life for hundreds of years. You can explore their local life and enjoy the unique architecture in the village. There are five drum towers standing in different directions and you can see the elders chatting in the tower or weaving their cloth.

After the tour, be transferred back to Zhaoxing Dong Village for accommodation.

Overnight in Zhaoxing

Day3 Zhaoxing-Tang’an-Dali

In the morning Take a local van to Tang’an in the morning, and start our hike from Tang’an to Zhaoxing, we can walk down the hills and pass through the rice fields to Zhaoxing, this walk takes 2 hours.

After lunch in Zhaoxing, we move to Dali in the afternoon, a village hidden behind the bamboo forest, it looks like an isolated world. The local old people do not want to move out and just prefer staying in their village.

Overnight in Dali village

Day4  Dali-Zenlei village-Shiqiao-Kaili

After the breakfast at hotel, we check out and visit a local market in Rongjiang first before we depart for other villages today.

After a drive of 1.5 hours, we visit Zenlei village of Shui group. Shui is a different group from Miao or Dong. We can take a walk around Zenlei village.

And move on to Kaili, visit Shiqiao village on the way. Shiqiao is famous for paper making with trees bark. This skill can be dated back to 600 years ago in Guizhou province.

Overnight in Wudong

Day5  Wudong(Wudong-Upper Langde-Wudong)

Visit Upper Langde Miao Village in the morning, and enjoy a local Miao welcoming ceremony in Upper Langde village and a dancing performance in the village. We can lunch in Langde if you would like. Or take an early dinner in Wudong today, cook fish by ourselves taught by a local female farmer, try to have a chance to taste famous Guizhou Miao cuisine SuanTangYu 酸汤鱼。Cuisine”Suan Tang Yu”, it sounds like sour soup fish with tomato soup mixed with less chili. So we need fish by ourselves in the local rice paddy field in Wudong. We visit Wudong in the afternoon. It takes only 1.5 hour to Wudong from Upper Langde. We can enjoy the nice walk around Wudong, since there is a beautiful footpath behind Wudong village.

Drive back to Wudong after Langde visit. It takes 1 hour to your hotel from Wudong by bus.

Overnight in Wudong

Day6 Wudong-Zhenyuan

After breakfast at your hotel, we take a drive of 40 minutes to the entrance of Xijia village, and start our short walk to Matang village, this short walk passing through local farmers’ vegetable fields and rice fields. Matang village is famous for batik making. People in Matang are called Gejia, they are not listed into Chinese 55 ethnic groups yet, but regarded as a subgroup of Miao. On the way to Zhenyuan, we can visit a local market in Longchang(it happens every 6 days) and visit Feiyunya (Flying Cloud Cliff Temple, 500 years old). After we arrive in Zhenyuan, check into your hotel first and take a walk around Zhenyuan, it is an ancient town with a long history of 2,000 years. Enjoy the night views in Zhenyuan

Overnight in Zhenyuan

Day7  Zhenyuan-Mountain Fanjingshan

Visit Zhenyuan in the morning and drive to Fanjingshan in the afternoon.

Walking through Zhusheng Bridge, the seven-hole blue stone arch bridge built in Ming Dynasty, you will get to Black Dragon Cave (also called Qinglong Cave). This is not simply a cave, but a ancient architectural complex of ancient temples, pavilions, shrines and palaces standing on Zhonghe Mountain. It well presents the Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism culture with the magnificent construction and layout. It is said that Zhang Sanfeng, the founder of Tai Chi, personally selected and involved in the construction of the temples. This scenic spot is composed of the following parts including the Zhusheng Bridge, Zhongyuan Temple, Ziyang Shuyuan (Academy of Classical Learning), Jade Emperor Pavilion, Longevity Palace and Xianglu Yan. The visit will be truly a cultural highlight during your Zhenyuan trip.

After the relaxing trip in Zhenyuan, drive to FanjingShan Region. It takes 2.5 hours from Zhenyuan to Fanjingshan scenic spot.

Overnight in at the foot of Fanjingshan

Day8  Mountain Fanjingshan-Tongren Airport  Departure

Good morning! After breakfast, your guide and driver will meet you at your hotel. Then, you will be driven not far to the entrance of Fanjingshan to discover this world well-known fantastic holy mountain along the popular south route for about 6 hours.

•Fanjingshan National Nature Preserve was listed as the UNESCO World Natural Heritage in 2018 with the peculiar conspicuous mountains formation in sea of karst retained from the remote era 65-2 million years ago and praised as the No.5 Buddhist Mountain in China for being the place of enlightenment of Buddha Maitreya.

•Enter the mountain and take a sightseeing bus for about 20 minutes to Yu’ao Station and continue to take the cable car there to catch a bird’s eye view of the dense emerald forest of Mount Fanjing during another 20 minutes in the air. Now, start your hiking from the Forest Hiking Road with 45 minutes up to witness the famous Mushroom Stone. It is the landmark of Fanjingshan and draws people’s follow by its unbelievable image of the bigger top quadrate putting off center on the smaller quadrate bottom, which forms like a mushroom vividly and seems easy to fall. However, for one million years, it just stands so still there after centuries of rain, snow, wind and sunburn. Remember to take a standard photo of tourists with it!

•Then, continue to hike for about 30 minutes to the Old Golden Summit and walk up to its peak. With an elevation of 2,494 meters, it is the best observation deck to appreciate the panorama of Fanjingshan with layers of forest of strange shaped stones, rolling verdant mountain range, and vegetation forest in light and dark green. Also, from the summit, you will see the iconic Red Clouds Golden Summit clearly from a distance.

•Then, walk down gradually to admire the natural scenery along the way to visit the sacred Buddhist attractions including Wanming Cave, Buddha Worshipping Stage, Monk Pagoda, Pudu Square, etc. You will not miss the Cheng En Temple that was built first from the Ming Dynasty and one of the four royal temples at Fanjingshan. Walk in the major temple with solemn scarlet walls and dark tiles, worship among the about 10 halls, and imagine the rising and falling and recovery of Fanjingshan’s Buddhist status in the past hundreds of years.

•Here, take your challenge to hike along the narrow, steep and rough steps with iron chain up to Red Clouds Golden Summit that shows particularly often on Fanjingshan photographs. This thumb-like peak is a world rare miracle erecting about 100 meters high from the flatter mountain bed millions of years ago and is separated with two peaks and a gorge by natural wearing and with a bridge linked between. After reaching the top, visit the appealing Temple of Buddha, the bridge and Maitreya Temple in sequence to feel walking from present to the future in Buddhist belief. While witnessing the hard-to-believe difficulty of building houses on such a steep crest, stand on the peak to command the panoramic view of Fanjingshan and enjoy the feeling of being in the “space in the sky”. (Note: You can choose to go up or not considering your physical condition at that time. Just tell your needs to the guide.)

•After the physical consuming hiking, walk by Jingxin Pool and go to see Wanbao Rock. You will truly believe Fanjingshan was in fact a part of ocean in the remote 1.4 million years ago by the strong proof of the cobbles, shells, paleontological fossils, and so on left within the shale rock there.

After the visit of Fanjingshan, we move to Tongren Fenghuang airport for the flight to next city, your Guizhou trip ends.