Chapter from the book "23 Reasons to Fall in Love with Hangzhou", written by Natasa Vujicic
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If you plan to visit the Mantoushan community, reserve another few hours of time to go up the Songcheng Lu (宋城路) towards Jade Emperor Mountain (玉皇山) and Phoenix Hill (凤凰山), the two main characters in the legend of West Lake’s creation (西湖明珠).
Once up, you can choose between two paths. The righthand one leads to the Tongming Cave (通明洞). If you decide to take this route, on the left side of the path you will notice inscriptions in stone and a small golden Buddha sculpture placed on a rock. As you step closer to take a look, you will realize that the rock is actually the entrance to a cave and that the cave is actually a hidden temple. On a bright day, you may catch the sun’s rays coming in through the hole, illuminating the altar. On a cloudy day, it may feel spooky, especially if you arrive minutes after someone burned incense and the smell is still strong.
After the cave, continue farther up the hill, following the sound from a radio in front of another small temple. At first this temple feels like it is filled with ordinary household items, but once you approach you will see different statues of Guanyin (观音), the Buddhist Goddess of Compassion, Mercy, and Kindness, each one specialized in making a particular wish come true. Some of the statues must have been brought from homes of people living nearby. I have always found that this little temple feels like the local residents built it with their bare hands.
Just a few more steps up the stairs, before the path curves to the left, take a peek through the fence. The five-meter-tall Buddha statues carved in the mountains in front of you are more than 1,000 years old. They belonged to the Shengguo Monastery (胜果寺), built during the Wuyue Kingdom (吴越时期) in the ninth century. The temple does not exist anymore, but the statues are still visible.
Farther up Phoenix Hill, you will reach a point where you are facing the Qiantang River and Fuxing Bridge. You are now standing on top of Phoenix Mountain and above the Mantoushan community. Below your feet is a scar in history and a place of eternal sorrow for the people of Hangzhou. Around this place, Emperor Gaozong of the Southern Song Dynasty (南宋南高宗赵构) had built gardens, palaces, and pavilions. In 1271, Kublai Khan (皇帝忽必烈), the grandson of Genghis Khan, established the Yuan Dynasty (元朝), which launched a massive attack on the Southern Song, culminating in the capture of the Song capital, Hangzhou. The remains of the palace got converted into the monastery. Only a few years later the monastery was almost completely destroyed by fire and it did not take long for it to turn into barren land. It still stands like that today. The Southern Song Dynasty officials who survived, including child-prince Zhao Bing (宋末帝赵昺) headed south and ended up in Guangdong. Under constant attacks from the Yuan army, the Song army was forced to retreat farther and farther south. In 1279, after another lost battle, the Songs were surrounded in Yashan (崖山). Unwilling to surrender to the enemy, Prime Minister Lu Xiufu (丞相陆秀夫), carrying the young prince on his back, jumped into the sea and drowned. The two were followed by 100,000 soldiers and civilians.
That was the end of the Song Dynasty.
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Back at the foot of the mountain, the lefthand path leads to Yueyan Cliff (月岩). In this place, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, you can see the moonlight penetrating through a hole in the rock and reflecting in the pool of water below. I have never seen it—my courage does not extend to wandering through the mountains in the middle of the night—but I can imagine that the sight of two of moons, one in the sky, the other on Earth, is breathtaking.
Farther along the lefthand path is Jade Emperor Mountain, and down its hills, toward the Octagonal Field, is the Lao Yu Palace (老玉皇宫). It’s a charming temple, housing a chamber dedicated to Yue Lao (月老), the God of Marriage. The place is full of red prayer ribbons tied everywhere, from the tree branches to the stairway tops.
If you continue down the hill, you will discover even more astonishing sights. First, the Ciyunling stone carvings (慈云岭造像)—another 1,000-year-old relic. In front of the statues is a stone table with stools covered in moss. Behind that is a small door. Head through the door, pass the toilet, turn left, go up, and look for Stone Dragon Cave (石龙洞) to see more statues carved out of stone. Once you have seen it, head down the hill toward the Octagonal Field . Have lunch somewhere on the water. Take it all in.
Jade Emperor Mountain and Phoenix Hill, to be honest, come with a bit of a spooky atmosphere. They are off the beaten path, which makes them more appealing, but at the same time people may be exactly what you will miss. Every now and then you will be happy to come across someone (anyone!) on your way up and down. The treasures these mountains keep are hidden and difficult to find. If you do not know what are you looking for, you will miss it. The phone map does not show the right locations. Inscriptions and imprints are difficult to read, difficult to understand, and covered in moss. You will hear sounds you cannot quite recognize. There will be attacking bees, broken stairs, and slippery slopes. Everything you see is either so unexpected or so difficult to find, that you will truly feel like you are on a quest. You will need a lot of determination to find some of the sightseeing points, but it will be well worth it. It provides a vague feeling that somehow everything (whatever that might be) begins here. It is no wonder that this is the place of the “Legend of the West Lake Creation”.
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