Gannan Five Days (Part 1)

Gannan, satisfy your plateau complex, yearning for Tibetan areas, various imaginations of grasslands, exploration of mysterious Tibetan Buddhism, and understanding of life elsewhere...Gannan in the summer of 2018 This trip is one of the highlights of my travels in recent years.

Departing from the northwest, I stayed at the Sunshine Hotel in Lanzhou. There happened to be a copy of "The Poems of Cangyang Gyatso" in the hotel room. I read it in the evening, and I was fascinated by both the life of Cangyang Gyatso and his poems. I am fascinated by Gannan, a Tibetan area I am about to visit.

Gannan was once the golden passage of the ancient Silk Road and the Tang-Tibet Road, and was also the main window for the social system of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Although Gannan is not as well-known as Tibet, it is also the "Shambhala of dreams" for many people. It is a place where faith is integrated into life.

Going deep into the Tibetan area, I was worried about high altitude sickness and unfamiliar road conditions, so I booked a carpool tour on Ctrip. To my surprise, I got a Buick business car with only four tourists and two others. We are an old couple from Shanghai, and the driver and tour guide Xiaoxiang is an enthusiastic and honest young man from the northwest. That means a great trip is about to begin.

Day 1

First stop: Milarepa Pagoda

Located in Hepo City, Amdo Tibetan District, Gansu Province

Tibet It is the most important temple of the Kagyu Sect (Bai Jiao) of Buddhism in the Amdo Tibetan area. The pavilion mainly enshrines Milarepa Buddha, the most legendary among the Tibetan people and well-known to women and children.

The building is nine floors high and is dedicated to the founders of various sects of Tibetan Buddhism, mainly Milarepa Buddha and his disciples. There are 1,270 wooden Buddha statues, Bodhisattvas, Dharma protectors and other various types of Buddha statues. Various murals reflecting the content of Tibetan Buddhism are large in scale, superb in painting techniques, and of high artistic value. There are two Milarepa Buddhist Pavilions in Tibetan areas of China. This Buddhist pavilion is one of the famous Tibetan Buddhist temples in the Amdo area. It has a majestic and magnificent architecture.

The prayer wheel outside the Buddhist pavilion

Second stop: Guomang Wetland

The only blue sky I saw on this trip was precious.

The grassland is full of flowers and stars. The most common ones are Gesang flowers.

The cute prairie dog hiding in the grass hole and playing hide and seek with us.

The third stop: the long-cherished Langmusi

On my first trip to the northwest six years ago, I heard this place name for the first time in Zhangye Colorful Danxia, ??and later in Xiamen Airlines magazine I saw an introduction about it on the Internet, and Langmusi has been deeply rooted in my heart since then.

Langmusi is a small town at the junction of Sichuan and Gansu provinces. It is surrounded by grasslands, woods, hills and red stone cliffs. It has a beautiful environment and is known as the "Little Switzerland of the East" .

Langmusi Temple is divided into two parts. One is Langmusi Temple in Dacang, Sichuan, also called Gerdi Temple. The Tiger Cave, Fairy Cave, Langmusi Grand Canyon and the relics of the flesh Buddha are all located on the side of Langmusi in Sichuan. . The other is a Gansu temple, also called Saichi Temple, which leads to the sky burial platform. The two temples watch each other across the creek.

Arriving in the evening, the first thing we went to was the Ganden Saichi Monastery in Gansu Province. The Ganden Saichi Monastery is on the Gansu side. The buildings are magnificent and each hall is topped with gold.

At dusk, there are few tourists. The temple environment is good. The temples are scattered along the hillside and have beautiful shapes. Although I didn’t see the breathtaking beauty of the legendary red rock cliffs dyed red by the sunset, the small town and red rock cliffs in the cloudy dusk also had a unique charm.

The temple of Saichi Temple is built on the mountain, with a magnificent appearance and splendid decoration. The exterior walls are painted red and bright yellow, with white walls and black windows. The colors are bright and bright. The style of Tibetan Buddhist temples is gorgeous and rich here.

That evening I was lucky enough to encounter a large-scale debate. Debate is one of the methods of training monks in Gelug monasteries. It is also a learning method in which monks in the monastery debate the meaning of scriptures with each other. It usually takes place after the sun goes down. It was held before, and the fierce debate could be heard from far away. From a distance, we saw the living Buddha wearing a tall hat patrolling among them. There were many silhouettes of people under the curtain of the temple. At this time, except for us, there were birds flying low in the sky. The quiet environment makes people feel mysterious warmth and inner touch.

After coming out of the temple, take a stroll in the town. It is a working day and there are few tourists. You can slow down and stroll around. The small shops here have outstanding styles and are very different from other places. As night falls, the cool breeze blows, and my traveling companions are eager to find jackets to keep out the cold.

Two days ago, we were still in the hot and sweltering southeast of Fuzhou. In the blink of an eye, we arrived at Langmusi, an altitude of 3,000 meters, wearing winter clothes. From summer to winter, we spanned four seasons in two days, and we were filled with freshness and excitement along the way. At night, it turned into a menacing high fever, headache, insomnia, and diarrhea.

My first day in Gannan ended in such an embarrassing way.