The day kicked off grey and dreary on my second day in the Wudang Mountains. I would have loved a strong, warm pick-me-up coffee, but we began the half an hour walk from our hotel to the bus hub without. We had foolishly forgotten to pack any and had tried in vain to procure some in the village before leaving. I knew China was a tea drinking country before I arrived here (obviously) but I hadn’t realize it was so not (and I repeat: NOT) a coffee drinking country. I’m not even a big coffee drinker. But this morning I really wanted a cuppa. Why is it you always want what you can’t have eh!
On a very positive note: my legs were grand after the first day of stairwalking yesterday. If you missed my first day in the Wudang Mountains, read up on it here. No signs of muscle ache whatsoever. Either practicing kungfu is paying off or I’ve got it all ahead of me tomorrow.
On a second positive note: we passed a very nice vendor who had nescafe sticks (coffee powder) for sale.
But I digress. Less coffee, more mountain! Our first stop was Monkey Valley.
Monkey Valley
Monkey Valley is – as the name implies – a valley full of free roaming monkeys. Well in the summer anyway – is what Jonathan told me. He had been there before and thought the monkeys might have migrated to a different place in the winter.
“What? Where?” I asked dumbfounded, as I envisioned a big troop of monkeys crossing China southwardly on a quest for warmer weather. Like birds do. I couldn’t recall ever hearing about monkeys migrating before, but maybe I had missed something in my education? (I can be ridiculously naive at times).
It took a good few minutes before his Mexican English and my Dutch understanding met each other on the same wave length. He had meant that they might retract to their caves in the mountain and not be out in the open. Do he mean they hibernate? Like bears? I wondered. But just in case I would make myself look even more foolish, I decided to stick with “Ahh” and hoped that we would at least spot one or two of them (perhaps the ones that suffer insomnia?)
But all worries were out of the window as we got out of the bus under the watchful eye of this particular specimen. Hello, monkey.
He looks all innocent and sweet doesn’t he? Try and take off your rucksack and give him the impression you have food in your possession, I dare you. This is what Jonathan did, completely unsuspecting of course. Within a split second, innocent-monkey pulled off a perfect Jekyll-and-Hyde as he transformed into devil-monkey. He made a beeline for Jonathan, viciously pulling his coat and trying to acquire what he obviously thought he had full rights to, screeching loudly.
Unfortunately I was too slow with my camera and only managed to snap this very blurry shot, but you get the picture. It was quite entertaining – for me, as a bystander, you know. Eventually Jonathan managed to shoo him off and we entered Monkey Valley.
The monkey retreated to a tree, back to pretending to be all innocent. But we knew better now.
Suddenly bridges had turned into places where you could get cornered. Luckily the above picture features a different monkey that eyed us as warily as we eyed him, but otherwise left us alone. Four unwarned tourists who had bought bread to feed the monkey’s (BAD move) from a vendor were not so lucky. The two women in the company shrieked as five monkeys closed in on them. Quite the spectacle.
But I digress.
Behold another set location of the Karate Kid. This is where Jackie Chan teaches Jaden Smith the intricacies of emptying your mind and going with the flow.
We then wandered off on this path by the creek and met more monkeys. They didn’t appear to care for rucksacks and/or food unlike their brothers (or sisters) at the entrance. We did stay a little bit wary because there were tons of them and wherever we looked, more seemed to be appearing either out of the forest or higher up out of caves in the mountain. So much for hibernation and migration!
This one struck quite the particular pose. My sister dubbed him ‘Escher monkey’.
This is the last monkey picture (I promise!) and the last picture of Monkey Valley. Back to the busstop and onto the Purple Heaven Palace.
Bus view interim
This is the view from the bus – just to give you a heads up if you’re thinking of coming here and are prone to getting car sick. The twenty minute drive between Monkey Valley and Purple Heaven Palace made my tummy turn and I was happy to put my feet onto solid ground.
Purple Heaven or Zixiao Palace
Well up till now I’ve been too preoccupied with coffee and monkeys to even mention the word Daoism. But behold here Zixiao Palace. This is one of the places on Wudang Mountain where Daoism is actively practiced by monks and priests. There is a Wudang kungfu school here as well and often times you will see the students practicing in the courtyard when you visit. Not today – because all school’s are closed for Chinese New Year and Spring Festival.
Zixiao Palace is interestingly also the place where my Shifu was educated in Wudang Kungfu. From his early years until the age of 18, he studied and practiced kungfu here. He lived in the town of Wudangshan and had to make it all the way to this tempel early morning and back again in the evening. The practice was hard and enduring – as traditional kungfu practice is – but it has brought him were he is today.
The dragon stands for power and benevolence in Chinese culture. Unlike in the west where they are usually portrayed maliciously, here they symbolize goodness and luck.
There may have been no kungfu students present at the time of our visit, but we were pleasantly surprised to hear the sound of beautiful voices chanting. Far away at first, but slowly moving closer, obviously making their way over the temple grounds. My best guess is that it was a ritual for the New Year, which was only about 7 hours away now. The women wear yellow robes, the men blue ones. A couple of visitors also took part in the procession.
While I was walking around the place, Jonathan had sat himself down against a wall and seemed lost in deep thought. He told me he wanted to stay here. Something special about this place, he said.
Funny thing is that a while ago in town, someone told me precisely the same thing about Zixiao Palace. He also didn’t want to leave. Something about the feng shui, the energies here, I imagine.
I loved the place too, but I did want to leave. If we didn’t we would miss the last bus up to Nanyan and that would mean a 4 hour hike up the mountain to the hotel.
A golden sunset
After having arrived back in Nanyan and strolling up the road to the start of the path to our hotel, we spotted bright golden light coming through what looked like a cave entrance. On exploration it brought us to quite the nice viewing point. A fitting end to another special day on Wudang Mountain.
