Longmen Grottoes (龙门石窟)

We arrived in Luoyang at 6:52 am Sunday morning, ate at the KFC in front of the train station and took a cab ride to the Longmen Grottoes (Longmen Shiku). The one-hour cab ride cost us 60 kuai (5 kuai flag-down rate).

From Wikipedia: "The Longmen Grottoes (龍門石窟/ 龙门石窟, lóngmén shíkū; lit. Dragon's Gate Grottoes) or Longmen Caves are located 12 km south of present day Luòyáng in Hénán province, China. The grottoes, which overwhelmingly depict Buddhist subjects, are densely dotted along the two mountains: Xiangshan (to the east) and Longmenshan (to the west). The Yi River flows northward between them. For this reason, the area used to be called Yique (The Gate of the Yi River). From north to south, the distance covered by grottoes is about one km. Along with the Mogao Caves and Yungang Grottoes, the Longmen Grottoes are one of the three most famous ancient sculptural sites in China. There are over 2100 niches, more than 100,000 statues, some 40 pagodas and 3600 tablets and steles in the caves of Guyang, Binyang and Lianhua."

The entrance of the site is about a kilometre from the parking area (or what feels like a kilometre walk). The bus number 53, 60, 80 and 81 stops are located in the parking area along with the shops selling souvenir goods. There are battery-operated cars for for 4 kuai that stops at the ticket booth and the east side fo the Longmen Bridge.



Tickets cost 120 RMB. This includes the entrance to the Caves on the East and West Hill, Xiangshan Temple and Bai Garden. The ticket booth is near the main gate (extension of the Longmen Bridge). I was so fascinated by the Longmen Bridge so I took a lot of pictures!



The sculptures are breathtaking, specially the massive sculptures of the Lu She Na Buddha and the Boddhisatvas.



We stayed at the grottoes for five hours - we didn't check out the Caves on the East Hill and the Xiangshan Temple on east bank of the Yi River because were tired but we did a quick tour of the Bai Garden.


By 5 pm, Liza and I ran out of things to do (or maybe because we have tired ourselves looking for a place to eat earlier). We stayed at the city square in Renmin Lu and played cards for half an hour before we decided to go to the airport.

Luoyang airport is still under construction, we were the only people at the airport aside from the two persons who are playing badminton inside the waiting area (we assumed they work there) - I thought we got lost again (there weren't even security guards!). People came trickling in at around 8 pm (check-in time). The plane took off early so we arrived in Beijing twenty minutes ahead of schedule.

Travel Plans: Luoyang (洛阳)

After changing the date of the trip several times, Liza and I have decided to go to Luoyang this weekend. We'll be taking the K269 overnight train to Luoyang and we'll take a plane back to Beijing.

I've bought the train tickets going to Luoyang at the Beijing Main train station (Beijing Zhan, 北京站) last Sunday. A friend said there is a booth at the station where foreigners can buy tickets but I couldn't find it. I asked at the information booth where I can get tickets and she pointed me to the booth near platform 4 (on the second floor, in front of the booth for Tianjin-bound trains). The lady at the booth doesn't speak English but she was able to understand the information I wrote regarding the destination, train number, the kind of ticket and date that I copied online (good thing I brought that piece of paper with me!). Train schedules and fare can be found at www.huochepiao.com. There is no soft sleeper tickets available, so I got us hard sleeper tickets for 197 kuai each.

They are not selling train tickets for Luoyang-Beijing trains at the station. I'm afraid that we won't be able to get tickets going back to Beijing the same day so I asked CITS about it. They told me to contact their Louyang branch for arrangements. I want to be sure that we'll be back here in Beijing the following Monday so I checked around online and I was able to get plane tickets through elong.net. The plane tickets cost 440 kuai each with taxes included. They have delivered it the same day that I booked it.

We're all set! We are planning to visit the Longmen Grottoes (Longmen Shiku, 龙门石窟) the whole day then come back to Beijing on the 9 pm flight.

From Wikipedia: Luoyang (simplified Chinese: 洛阳; traditional Chinese: 洛陽; pinyin: Luòyáng) is a prefecture-level city in western Henan province, People's Republic of China. It borders the provincial capital of Zhengzhou to the east, Pingdingshan to the southeast, Nanyang to the south, Sanmenxia to the west, Jiyuan to the north, and Jiaozuo to the northeast.

Situated on the central plain of China, one of the cradles of the Chinese civilization, Luoyang was one of the Four Great Ancient Capitals of China.