Anshun

Understand

Anshun is a popular tourist destination just south of Guiyang. Waterfalls, caves and cool temperatures make Anshun an ideal summer vacation spot. The average temperature of Anshun is about 21 °C in summer. The best season to visit it is from June to October. Anshun ranked No 2 in a list of the Top Attractions of summer 2018, released by China Tourism Academy in July, following only Kunming of Southwest China's Yunnan province. Today's city survives on tourism, subsistence farming, and its traditional batik industry, which capitalizes on the highly developed textile skills of the local Bouyi minority. The road between Anshun and Huangguoshu is roughly where Bouyi country starts to get interesting, so you could take a break between the must-see destinations to walk the countryside and do a little exploring. The Bouyi number around 3 million and live throughout western Guizhou. A writing system for the Bouyi language was devised in the 1950s and is used to record their rich folk literature. Surrounded by karst hills, Anshun has one of Guizhou's most scenic landscapes in the province. Central Guizhou is the most travelled region of the province and it is also where the province's star sights, such as Huangguoshu Falls, Longgong Caves and Zhijin Cave, as well as its capital city, Guiyang, are located. Tourists flock here to Huangguoshu, the tallest waterfall in China. While not very well known to westerners, the Chinese TV version of the “Journey to the West” being filmed here means that almost everybody in China knows this scenery. Located on the Baishui River in Anshun, it is 77.8 meters high and 101 meters wide. Tourists can view the falls from many different angles, at the six main observation decks. Other popular sites, include the kaleidoscopic Dragon Palace Cave, and the Getu Karst Park which hosted the 2014 Black Diamond International Rock Climbing Championships. The Great Arch has become a magnet for technical climbers. Measuring 70 metres high and seventy metres across it is one of the largest such formations in the world and a challenge to thrill seekers from around the world. The Dragon Palace Cave is a spectacular underground karst cave 32 km southwest of Anshun. You can take a boat into the cave to view its spectacular subterranean scenery. This is not very far away from the fascinating Zhongdong or Middle Cave where until around 2008 around twenty families were living in a humongous limestone cavern 1,800 metres (5,900 ft) up a mountain. This used to be the world's only year-round settlement inside a naturally occurring cave in China. Fifteen

Getting there

Frequent buses travel between Guiyang and Anshun. The trip takes about 2 hours. There is still almost one hour's trip from Anshun to the famous waterfall, Huangguoshu. Buses to Anshun leave from every one of Guiyang's stations (¥25, two hours, every 20 minutes from 07:00 to 19:00). Any Guiyang bound bus out of Xingyi or Weining will also let you off in Anshun if you tell the driver. There are several bus stations in Anshun that are useful to travellers. The north bus station (客车北站; keche beizhan) has buses (¥34, three hours, every 20 minutes, 07:00 to 18:00) to Zhijin town (for Zhijin Cave). Almost every other bus now leaves from the new east bus station (东客运站; dong keyunzhan), 10 km east of the centre. Bus 16 (¥1) runs here from Zhonghua Nanlu opposite the Xixiushan Binguan. A taxi is ¥25 to ¥30.

Guiyang ¥35, 1½ hours, every 20 minutes (07:10 to 19:10) Huangguoshu ¥20, one hour, every 20 minutes (07:20 to 19:00) Kunmíng sleeper ¥150, 10 hours, four daily (09:00, 10.40, 13:00 and 16:00) Longgong Caves ¥10, 40 minutes, every 30 minutes (07:30 to 18:00) Pingba ¥15, 40 minutes, every 30 minutes (07:30 to 18:30) Shuicheng ¥60, 3½ hours, every 50 minutes (08:20 to 16:40) Weining ¥90, five to six hours, one daily (10:00) Yunfeng ¥5, 40 minutes, every 30 minutes (07:30 to 18:00)

By train The original Anshun Railway Station on Zhonghua Road and was built in 1960. Sleepers from here used to take ten hours to Kunming and 12 hours up to Chongqing. The new Anshun West railway station is part of the Hangchangkun Passenger Railway on the Kunming – Guiyang High Speed Train. From Kunming South Station to Guiyang North Station is a distance of 463 km (288 miles) which takes between two and three hours. Every day, there are about 40 G-trains departing from Kunming South Railway Station from about 07:00 to 21:00. With much shorter travelling time than driving for over 7 hours, it is easy to stop in Anshun (about 1 hour 40 minutes to 2 hours 15 minutes from Kunming South), and visit the famous Huangguoshu Waterfall on the way. In turn this is part of the 2,066-km (1,284 mi) Shanghai–Kunming high-speed railway, which passes through the four provincial capitals, of Hangzhou, Nanchang, Changsha, and Guiyang. The last section, Guiyang–Kunming, was opened on 28 December 2016. Most of the non-high-speed trains heading east stop in Guiyang (¥15, 1½ hours, regular), but they are slowly being phased out in favour of the G trains. It is still hard to get sleeper reservations for trains from here; pick them up in Guiyang at the ticket office a few hundred metres north of the train

Getting around

Bus Number 1 zips around town from the train station and up Tashan Donglu, and on past the Hongshan Binguan. Bus 2 travels between the train station and the north bus station. Bus 16 runs from Zhonghua Nanlu to the east bus station. Buses cost ¥1. Taxi flagfall is ¥6.

See

Confucian Temple. The ancient temple now becomes an elegant tea-house. Hongshan Shuiku (near the downtown). A big reservoir.

1 Yellow Fruit Tree Falls (Anshun) (黄果树大瀑布). (updated Dec 2024) 1 Huang Guo Shu Waterfalls. This is one of the largest waterfalls in China. It is visible from the front, and you can walk through the cave behind the falls to see it from the back. You will get wet from the spray and mist if you go anywhere near the main fall, so bring a raincoat. The entrance fee does not include the bus within the park, which is ¥50 extra. The bus from Anshun to Huangguoshu Falls leaves from Anshun East Bus Station, takes an hour, and costs ¥24. ¥180. (updated Apr 2018) Longgong Caves (龙宫洞), Longtan Village, Longgong Town, Xixiu District, ☏ +86 853 322 3173. The vast cave network snakes through twenty hills just 17 miles (27 km) SW of Anshun and 100 km (62 miles) SW of Guiyang. Dragon Castle and Tianchi Lake, the Underground River Karst Cave is 15 km long and is the longest water Karst cave in China; Dragon Gate Flying Waterfall - is the biggest waterfall inside a Karst cave in China. This is a mountain lake that is about 90 meters above the river bed below. The large lake was formed when water from the above cave broke an opening at the bottom thus creating a lake below. You can actually see the water rushing in and making a deafening noise.;Despite the elaborateness of the Longgong park site, it represents only a small portion of the ninety or more caves in this network. However, like the Huangguoshu Falls area nearby, this region continues to be aggressively developed for tourism – and signs regularly appear pointing the way to modest new ‘scenic sights’ within the Longgong area. Only six caves, all connected by an underground river covering 854 m (2,800 ft), are open to exploration, accessed by boat through the flooded entrance, Tian Chi (Heaven’s Pool), which is partially concealed by a 40-m (130-ft) high waterfall. Inside, the largest cavern is about 80-m (260-ft) high. The caves are filled with colorfully-lit stalactites and stalagmites, and numerous oddly-shaped rock formations. During the rainy season, the boat ride ends at Tiger Lair, a broad platform from where visitors hike out of the caves and walk back to the entrance through an attractive stone forest of weathered karst spikes. The cave is visited by taking a boat tour through the cave but on the far side you have the option to get off and walk to the dry Tiger Cave. The mountain lake runs down to the river below in an impressive waterfall.;Most other sights here will be anticlim

Do

The old part of Anshun, which lies in the northern of the centre area, is a nice place for an evening walk.

Festivals and events A few minor festivals are held in the Anshun area, though they are generally not as spectacular as those held around Kaili. None of them are worth the trip to Anshun alone, but if you happen to be in town already, they are a pleasant diversion and certainly a nice excuse to get out and explore the countryside. Always double-check dates with local tourism officials before heading off into the wilds to attend any of the following festivities as dates are known to change from year to year, as well as the location. Tiaohua Flower Dance Festival Held in Miao villages during the first lunar month. The main location in Anshun is Flower Dance Hill, a few kilometres northwest of town; festivities occur from the 4th to the 6th of the first lunar month. Other gatherings are held at Machang and Gaofeng villages (Pingba County), halfway between Anshun and Guiyang, and in Qingzhen town. Sanyuesan At Pogong (Guanlǐng County), 80nkm southwest of Anshun, and at Huohua (Ziyun County), 100 km south of Anshun, on the 3rd day of the third lunar month. The festival has different significance depending on what minority group is celebrating it, however, all groups mark it with singing and dancing. Sìyueba ‘Ox King’ Festival Held at Jiuzhou and Shuangbao villages, both about 25 km east of Anshun, on the 8th day of the fourth lunar month. Liuyueliu is a Bouyi festival at Luohe (Ziyun County), 67 km southeast of Anshun, and Lazhai (near Huangla town), 56 km east, on the 6th of the sixth lunar month. Activities include ground opera and singing competitions. Eating New Rice Festival Held at Huolong and Dagouchang villages, 55 km east of Anshun, south of the main highway, sometime during the seventh or eighth lunar months. Newer festivals include the Guizhou Batik Festival, a state-sponsored festival set up to display (and flog) batik to the tourists from the 28–29 September. Authorities have also introduced the annual Guizhou Anshun Aviclub General Aviation Flight Carnival, which will hold promotional events for air travel.

Buy

The region produces a lot of batik (蜡染画; làrǎn huà), some of the batik you see in Dali and most of it in Yangshuo is from Guizhou. There are also various other handicrafts. There are a group of stores selling these and other tourist bric-a-brac along the west side of the main street just north of the bus station. The train station is at the south end of the same street. The stretch of Zhonghua Nanlu near Zhonghua Donglu is where the city's big commercial stores and shopping centres are located. The Wholesale Market of Small Goods in Anshun (Anshun Laran Shichang; Zhonghua Nanlu; 中华 南路) is the city's main market and probably the most interesting place to prowl. For a peek at the more contemporary side of Anshun, Gufu Jie is a street of trendy clothing stores and bakeries, and snack stalls that get so packed on weekends it is hard to move. Several ethnic groups across southwestern China have been traditionally involved in creating batik. For almost 1,000 years, the Bouyi around Anshun have been using batik as a background to embroidery on clothing, and since the establishment of a factory in Anshun in the 1950s, have come to monopolize the indigenous textile market. The designs, which were originally of abstract plants and animals, are drawn with wax on cloth. The cloth is then dyed in indigo before being boiled to remove all traces of the wax, leaving the pattern in white on a blue background. The earlier monochromatic batiks have now given way to multi-colored, mass-produced designs, which include stylized representations of zodiac animals, scenes from Bouyi legends, and mythical creatures. Today, Anshun's batik is in great demand across China.

Eat

There are lots of places to eat in Anshun, but precious little to recommend. There is a food market down an alley off Zhonghua Nanlu, just south of the Bank of China. There are some bakeries and several hole-in-the wall places on Gufu Jie. There is also a huge supermarket on Zhonghua Nanlu, perfect for picking up snacks for day trips. Be forewarned: dog is eaten in these parts… lots of dog. You will often see the skinned animals boiled and propped up outside restaurants as an enticement to customers.

Xiaoshu Bingfen (小舒冰粉), Rural Commercial Bank Lane, Zhonghua Middle Road (中华中路农商银行巷子内), ☏ +86 13688535215. 12：00-24：00. Xiaoshu Bing Fen sells a specialty food in southwestern China - Bing Fen. The specialty food of Xiaoshu Bing Fen is Bing Jiang, which is made from fresh fruits, milk, and ice cubes. ¥12. (updated Oct 2023) Guizhou cuisine • Guizhou cuisine (黔人百味 • 贵州菜), Next to Fuhua Hotel, Yingbin Avenue, Buyi and Miao Autonomous County, Zhenning, ☏ +86 17588673045. (updated Jun 2024) Buyi eight bowls.• Colorful Qian Yun Restaurant (布依八大碗•多彩黔韵餐厅), Huangguoshu Scenic Spot, Zhenning Buyi and Miao Autonomous County, ☏ +86 15885726850. (updated Jun 2024) Noble maple flavor (贵枫味), 15 Yingbin Avenue, Buyi and Miao Autonomous County, Zhenning, ☏ +86 17585432049. (updated Jun 2024)

Sleep

There are twin rooms for ¥100 just on the left when you leave the train station. There is a lot of midrange accommodation in Anshun that is geared to Chinese tour groups, which is generally drab and undistinguished. Anju Binguan (220 1359) has budget rooms right next to the station but the bathrooms are tiny. Directly opposite is the Xixhiushan Binguan (221 1888) has doubles for ¥200-300 but the rooms are ridiculously cramped. Bathrooms are exactly the opposite – sparsely outfitted and often the same size or bigger than the actual sleeping area. Gongdianju Zhaodaisuo on (332 9124) Zhonghua Nanlu; 中华南路; only has basic little budget rooms with Chinese toilets and cubby-hole-like showers with no doors. Henghuangshan Dajiudian (Golden Phoenix Mountain Hotel (322 5663) with its garish classical Greek façade on Tashan Donglu; 塔山东路58号) has similarly priced rooms that definitely starting to show their age. Among foreign tourists, the two most popular choices are the two western branded properties.

Set on the edge of the beautiful Hong Shan Lake, but still in the city center, DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Anshun is adjacent to the municipal government, and offers easy access to highways, the train station and airport. Huang Guo Shu Waterfall is only 40 km away, and the Wen Temple of Anshun is within walking distance. Friendly staff greet you on arrival with a signature, warm chocolate chip cookie. Ask for a room overlooking the lake. They are slightly more expensive than the standard US$60 rooms, but are definitely worth it. The sunrise over the lake is breathtaking, and a fantastic way to start the day. Popular with business travelers on Hilton Honours Benefits. The view from the Executive Lounge is especially impressive. On the downside, even up here on the non-smoking floor, so of the rooms have really strong ashtray odours. A walk around Hong Shan Lake waterfront reveals swimmers in the lake and locals doing exercises. Ask the Concierge for directions to Gu Fu Jie at night, which is a buzzing food street. Tel: 851 3366 9666 No.42 Hongshanhu Road. Howard Johnson Hot Spring Resort Anshun is 3 km from the airport and very convenient the high-speed railway station. Rooms and public areas are tastefully decorated with examples of local culture and characteristics. There is even a sky garden so that you can enjoy the surrounding mountain scenery By the time you read this, the hot springs will be open and operational. Special family suites make the place very suitable for those travelling with children. 219 Xihang Road.

Huangguoshu Galaxy Holiday Inn (黄果树银河假日酒店), No

Go next

The long-distance station on the corner of Zhonghua Nanlu and Huangguoshu Dajie has a handful of handy destinations, and the bus stand in front of the train station has buses for numerous provinces in the southeastern part of China. These are much reduced with the arrival of the high-speed train but still represent a budget option for immigrant factory workers and masochistic backpackers. Destination Price Duration Frequency Departs Foshan ¥260 19hr daily 12:00 Fuzhou ¥360 32hr daily 12:00 Guangzhou ¥240 20hr daily 12:00 Shenzhen ¥280 22hr daily 12:00 Xiamen ¥320 28hr daily 12:00

By bus Local buses depart every hour from Anshun's East bus station (¥5-10, 30 to 40 minutes, every 20 to 30 minutes from 07:00 to 17:00). The last bus returns to Anshun at 17:00. From March to October, minivans to microvans run all day between Longgong and Huangguoshu (¥15-30, 30 minutes), leaving when full. They run infrequently, if at all, the rest of the year, but there are always plenty of taxis at the Huangguoshu parking lot that you can take.