Gigantic grottoes being destroyed by both man and nature, a 1,000-year-old wooden pagoda that has withstood deadly earthquakes, an equally old suspended temple on a cliff and Pingyao Ancient City where China's first bank was founded as well as being the location for the film "Raise the Red Lantern".

North China's Shanxi Province is known to many southern folks for its rich coal reserves, but its cultural heritage is, in fact, equally abundant.

Yungang Grottoes

The Yungang Grottoes, only 16 kilometres west of Datong, the second largest city in Shanxi, are among the three largest grottoes in China, along with Mogao in Northwest China's Gansu Province and Longmen in Luoyang, in Central China's Henan Province.

The Yungang Grottoes were built over a span of 64 years during the Northern Wei Dynasty (about 500 AD) after the dynasty unified the Yellow Reaches in Northern China.

National resources were pooled and top craftsmen gathered to create this wonder of Chinese carving.

The existing grottoes include 45 main caves and 207 auxiliary caves, with a total of 51,000 carvings.

Buddhist art and culture permeate the caves. Carvings, large, small or miniature, tell their religious stories from the Northern Wei Dynasty, when Buddhism was strongly promoted.

The splendours preserved today would impress any tourist. They simply eclipse any carvings by modern artists and deserve to be on the list of United Nations World Cultural Heritage Sites.

But the mountainous piles of coal less than a kilometre from the grottoes seem to be a great threat to their preservation.

We spent just a few hours there to get a glimpse of the miracle and didn't really get the chance to engage in a detailed examination of the caves. If you are interested in Buddhist art or carvings, you should spend days - or even months - getting to know more about the mystery of the grottoes.

Suspended Temple

The Suspended Temple, known in Chinese as Xuankong Si, is an hour's drive from Datong. Built half way up mountainous cliffs during the Northern Wei Dynasty about 1,400 years ago, it is an awesome architectural achievement. It looks somewhat like a colossal wooden sculpture in the air.

With beams inserted into the rock and dozens of columns supporting it from the outside, the temple has 40 rooms connected by winding corridors.

Unlike many other temples, here Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism have been worshipped together in the same hall, showing the great harmony between these belief systems.

Famous Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai left his carving "zhuang guan", meaning "magnificent" on the cliff. Ming Dynasty adventurer Xu Xiake also marvelled at the magnificence of the temple.

Though repaired several times in history, the temple's structure is now probably facing its biggest ever test, with an influx of tourists brought to the valley by modern transport.

After a 10-minute walk up the steps the Hengshan reservoir looms into view, a vast body of clear water, rare in dry Shanxi Province. If you take a ferry from there, you can set off on a quick half-day sightseeing hike through Hengshan, a Taoist resort characterized by lush greenery, hot springs, pavilions and monasteries.

With its peak at 2,017 metres above sea level, Hengshan actually meanders for a distance of several hundred kilometres, comprising a total of 108 major peaks.

It is said that about 4,000 years ago the Shun Emperor named the mountains Bei Yue, the chief of the mountains.

Wooden pagoda

The Yingxian Timber Pagoda is about two hours slow drive from Datong on highways shared by overloaded coal trucks from nearby mines.

Built in 1056 during the Liao Dynasty, the 67.32-metre pagoda, the largest existing wooden pagoda in China, is definitely a must-see in Shanxi. It is another architectural wonder of my Shanxi tour and definitely a wonder for the whole of China.

With an octagonal cross section, the frame of the pagoda is completely made of wooden parts solidly linked by many mortises and tenons held together by a sophisticated system of brackets, in 54 different varieties.

It is said that earthquakes throughout history destroyed surrounding buildings several times, leaving only the pagoda intact.

The many Buddhist statues - especially the huge Sakyamuni statue on the first floor - and frescoes are as intriguing as the architecture.

Raise the Red Lantern

Saying farewell to the wooden pagoda with a lunch enriched by Shanxi alcohol, we embarked on a monotonous five-hour drive to the provincial capital Taiyuan to see the Pingyao Ancient City, another UN World Cultural Heritage Site.

Entering Pingyao is like returning into history. Ten-metre high city walls, first built in 1370, encircle an area of folk houses, many of which operate as restaurants and shops selling fake antiques and folk art, as well as beef - a local speciality.

Despite this bad phenomenon, similar to many other Chinese tourist sites, Pingyao is worth a stroll and exploration.

The Ri Sheng Chang was the most notable attraction, a former banking institution and precursor to modern Chinese banks.

The Qiao Family House was the highlight of Pingyao. It was the place where the movie, "Raise the Red Lantern," starring Gong Li, was shot.

As in the movies, you can witness the grandeur of rich families in China's history and get to know, by way of the tour guide's introduction, some of the Confucian codes ruling Chinese families.

Pingyao was saved in the early 1980s thanks to the suggestion of Ruan Yisan, professor of architecture at Shanghai Tongji University, when local government wanted to dismantle old houses to widen roads.

Even today the local government has more to do to make it as tidy and clean as Lijiang, another famous ancient city in South China's Yunnan Province.

Travel tips

We started the trip in Datong, Shanxi Province after spending some time in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. Tourists can take a train or fly directly to the provincial capital Taiyuan in the south of the province. The Wutai Mountains, about three hours drive from Datong, are among the most famous Buddhist resorts in China.

Different levels of accommodation are available. The Datong Hotel in Datong and the Suiyuan Hotel in Taiyuan where we stayed are nice four-star hotels.

Food choices are wide in today's Shanxi, but be sure to try some local snacks - especially the noodles and pies.

(Shanghai Star September 28, 2002)