Emei Mountain lies seven kilometers southwest of Emeishan City and is one of the four mountain ranges in China that Buddhists consider sacred. It was included in the UNESCO world heritage list in 1996. The mountain stretches more than 200 kilometers from south to north. Its main peak, Wanfo Top, is 3,099 meters above sea level. Since ancient times Emei Mountain has been described as “Beauty Under Heaven”. Temples were built as early as the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220) and Buddhism was introduced to the mountain during the Jin Dynasty. In the Ming and Qing dynasties there were more than 150 temples.
A legend claims that the mountain was where Samantabhadra gave lectures on Buddhism and most temples house a statue of Samantabhadra. The main scenic spots on the mountain include the Baoguo Temple, Wannian Temple, Fohu temple, Qingyin Pavilion, Heilongjiang Tunnel, Hongchun Platform, Xianfeng Temple (Jiulao Cave), Xixiang Pond and Golden Summit. These places are at different altitudes and have different climates. Temperatures at the top of mountain are 15 degrees lower than at the foot. Emei Mountain is a well-known natural museum with more than 3,000 specimens of plants and 2,000 types of animals including groups of monkeys that appear on the mountain roads and fascinate the tourists.(you can get more New York,Los Angeles,San Francisco, Chicago flights and airfares info at Travel2ChinaInfo Dot COM)
1. How to get in?
The traffic of Mt. Emei is very convinient. You can choose the flights,trains or buses to get in. For the flights, you can fly to Chengdu Shuangliu Airport first, then transfer to a tourist bus. Mt. Emei is about 120 kilometers away from Chengdu and the tourist bus will go through the high way. It takes only 90 minutes to get to Mt. Emei from Chengdu. For the trains, you can take the K145, K113, K165 or K117 to the station named “Mt. Emei”. This railway station is only 10 kilometers away from the Mt. Emei.(about 15 minutes’ ride) Another option is to get to Chengdu by train first, then transfer to a tourist bus to the Mt. Emei. For the buses, you can take the tourist bus from Chengdu,Leshan,Chongqing or Mianyang. The tourist bus in Chengdu is available in every 30 minutes and it takes 2 hours to get to Mt. Emei.(cost 35 rmb) The tourist bus in Leshan is available in every 10 minutes and it takes 30 minutes. (cost 8 rmb)
2. Admission fees for Mt. Emei:
120 rmb for one person. (students and people older than 60 can get a 50% off) For the aerial tramways, it costs 60 rmb for the round trip. There is a Hongzhushan Hot Spring Club in Mt. Emei and the cost is 128 rmb for one person. (50% off for the kids shorter than 1.1 meters)
3. Accommodations:
There are a lot of temples in Mt. Emei and they all provide the guest rooms for the travellers. I will recommend the guest rooms of the big temples here. If you choose the small temples, the conditions will be not so good. (especially the rest rooms) Usually, the cost is from 60 rmb to 160 rmb for these guest rooms in Mt. Emei. If you don’t like these places, you can choose the hotels. There are 2 five stars hotels in Mt. Emei and the cost is about 300 U.S. dollars.