Magnificent mountains of central China

Ever since I returned in mid September from the extraordinary trip through the mountains of Central China I've been haunted by them. I have been privileged to visit China five times over the past three decades--and have traveled extensively in Yunnan, and even across much of Southern Tibet. I visited great cities along the east coast from Hong Kong, Shanghai, the Shandong Peninsula and of course Beijing. There were lots of mountains in many of these areas, but not until this past trip did I finally go to the great central heartland--between Xi-An (the ancient capital Chang An) and the Sichuan plateau and then down to the Yizhang gorge region--three epicenters of Chinese civilization which are nestled, so to speak, between a vast complex of sugarloaf mountains the scope and complexity of which dumbfounded me.

Most jarring of all was the realization that those Chinese paintings of mountains I've admired all my life, thinking they were flights of fantasy were actually quite realistic.

The focus of this trip was woody plants, especially trees since it was organized by the International Dendrological Society (I.D.S.)--an august very international group which in this instance had participants from more than a half dozen countries. I knew China was unusually rich in woody plants--and assumed most of that biodiversity was further south, in the Western extremities of the Himalaya. I was vaguely aware that Metasequoia, Gingko, Acer griseum (for instance) were found further north a bit. I had no concept that we would find hundreds of taxa in the complex, mostly karst mountains clustered in China's very heart. 

I will intersperse the far too few pictures I took of these mountains with a few palate cleansers--like this shot of Chinese quite literally circle dancing below us at one of our outdoor dinner venues. My dullish shots of green mounds might get a tad tedious otherwise. I confess that of the several thousand photos I took, far too many are of green leaves of the vast assortment of trees we encountered--not to mention an awful lot of the mind-boggling fern flora and rich herbaceous layer we weren't suppose to notice.

And it was misty and even rainy many days (this was still part of the monsoon season), and I came to realize that much of China is really warm temperate rain forest! 

Our drivers (we had a fleet of sturdy vehicles at our command) were all characters. This car belonged to someone who was manifestly Buddhist, and that the photo was taken at 12:08 pm on September 2 of 2025. On a Tuesday to be exact.

We traversed just a sliver of two enormous mountain ranges--the QinLing between Shanxi province and Chongqing (effectively and formerly the eastern portion of Sichuan province). and then the Daba mountains 

Unless you've actually been there, it's hard to believe the diversity of plant life: we must have seen a couple hundred kinds of ferns, and more woody genera than I dreamed possible. There had to have been a couple dozen kinds of maples, for instance. I was so focused on the near ground I simply forgot to look up much of the time, and took far too few pictures of the scenery.

Oh yes, fungi galore!

A vista taken in a big bend of the road.

The roads were incredibly well maintained, although the near rain-forest vegetation did try and take over at times!

We finally arrived at the Yangtze.

More mushrooms--love how these come out of the overlapping scales of the pine cone!

How fun it would be to repel down those cliffs (not for myself however)...what treasures must lurk there...

The graceful characters transliterate as "Shen Nong Jia"--the name of the national park where we stayed the longest.

And here is Shen Nong Jia hinself: the deity spirit of the region. We were fortunate to visit during a slow period in September: the park is swamped with visitors from March to August (when it's cooler here than in the surrounding heavily populated lowlands) and again in November due to fall color.

Every view seemed different.

Lots of rugged rocks as well in spots.

We did have wonderful meals and stays at elegant inns and hotels.,,,

And lots of misty days--we were in the monsoon season still. Fortunately not a lot of hard rain.

Proof positive I was there!

How fun it would be to go back in spring, or brave the crowds to see the fantastic fall color. Perhaps another lifetime...although if you live long enough, dreams you didn't even know you had come true!