Tiantaishan (Zhejiang)

Tiantaishan (Mount Tiantai, 天台山) is in Tiantai County, Taizhou City, Zhejiang Province, China.

Understand
Tiantaishan (Mount Tiantai) includes several separate scenic areas, including a national forest park, gorgeous gorges, waterfalls, and the head temple for the Tiantai sect of Buddhism. Its highest peak, Huading, is 1,138 m (3,734 ft) high.

Tiantai is an extremely popular name for mountains in China, making it important to ensure that you're getting information on the correct one. This Tiantaishan is probably the most famous, but there is also a Tiantaishan National Park outside Chengdu, in Sichuan.

Tiantaishan has several separate areas to visit. Each of the scenic areas takes 1-2 hours to visit.

History
Guoqing Temple is the headquarters of Tiantai Buddhism, named for the mountain, which focuses on the Lotus Sutra. The most prominent teacher of that school, Zhiyi, was based here. It has long been an important destination for pilgrims, especially from Japan. The mountain was visited by Saichō in 805, who went on to found the related Japanese Buddhist school, Tendai, and the Cheondae school of Buddhism in China also traces its roots to this mountain.

Landscape
The area includes granite canyons and a small peak of red conglomerate. Most is forested ridges. One of the more famous sights is a waterfall that emerges from under an extremely rare, 7m-long granite natural bridge.

Flora and fauna
One of nine remaining wild populations of Seven-Son Flower Heptacodium miconioides is located on Mount Tiantai.

In the Huading (summit) area, several parts of the hillside are covered in ancient rhododendrons or azaleas.

Get in


The nearest rail station is Sanmenxian (三门县) station on the high-speed Ningbo-Taizhou-Wenzhou line, but the four buses per day to Tiantai leave from a station 10km away, and rail service is limited. A taxi to Tiantai costs about ¥120-150. There are more trains at Ninghai and Taizhou, but Ninghai has only four buses per day to Tiantai, the Tiazhou bus station especially is far from the main rail station, and a taxi will cost significantly more from these cities. If you're coming from Hangzhou or Ningbo, it may be best to take a bus from there.

Fees and permits
Each of the scenic areas sells its own admission tickets, along with separate rates for return shuttle buses to a tourist distribution centre near town. However, there are significant savings available if you combine the tickets with the shuttle bus, or buy (multiple-)day passes (which include the shuttle buses). Two of the scenic areas are double-ended, with a shuttle bus available to connect the ends for ¥5 (every half hour).

In addition, there is an electric golf cart shuttle service available between the Guoqing parking lot and the entrance to the temple precinct, if you want to save yourself a pleasant 600m walk overlooking farms and a creek.

Get around
There is a park shuttle bus network, but since every scenic area is accessible by private vehicles, few people use these buses, and some only run once an hour. Most destinations on the mountain only offer shuttle buses back to the tourist centre, not to each other. Having your own transportation is best, the buses work if you don't mind sitting around waiting for buses, or if you're in a hurry you can hire a car and driver. In principle you can also hike. There may be an old stone trail between Guoqing temple and the summit, but elsewhere you'll be lucky to find alternatives to the road.

Note that the shuttle buses, scenic areas, and the tourist centre all open not long after sunrise, and close well before sunset (in winter, typically 07:00-16:00), with the last buses returning at 17:00, so it pays to get an early start on the day.

See
Each scenic area takes 1-2 hours to visit, and charges its own admission fee.



Do
With its long history of temples and pilgrimages, the mountain has plenty of stone trails available for hiking. Many are overgrown, not well maintained, or covered in algae, and very few are shown on maps, so exercise caution or find a local guide.



Sleep
Tiantai County at the base of the mountain has plenty of hotels, and there are several villages on the mountain, all of which are well-equipped with guesthouses. The tourist centre is in the middle of nowhere, with few accommodation options within walking distance.



Go next

 * Taizhou
 * Wenzhou
 * Ningbo