This place currently maybe one of the least informative world heritage sites in China, but after long internet searching, it is a great surprised to discover that visiting Danxiashan National Park, part of China Danxia, is very easy from Guangzhou, or even Hong Kong, and I am really happy to visit this beautiful place in one of the least visited places in the region. Danxia is a name of red sandstone landform in southern China, has many similarities with Monumental Valley and Canyonlands National Park in Utah, USA, but in the lush tropical forest of Southeast Asia environs creating unique landscape of red rock which in my opinion this place is the red version of classic Chinese mountain.

By the infamous Chinese 310 Km/h high speed train from Guangzhou, I was in Shaoguan for less than 50 minutes (normal train will take 2-4 hours!). From the new train station, I took a bus to the old train station in the city center for 2 RMB and then took another bus to Danxiashan which depart frequently for 16 RMB. After an hour with many beautiful views of Danxia landscape along the road, the bus dropped me at a casino, part of tourist complex in front of the gate of the national park, a truly typical Chinese tourist facility. I walked through the sleepy complex; clearly Danxiashan was not a popular tourist destination (yet), to the office ticket. The entrance fee was 100 RMB for weekday and 120 RMB for weekend, quite cheap compared to other famous national park in China and the ticket was a hard plastic card, a good souvenir.

Inside the park was well organized with many tourist buses that took me to every point of interest. My first chosen place to visit was the famed and one of the landmarks of the park, Yangyuan Stone or male stone, the large red phallus stone, actually Danxiashan also has Yingyuan Stone or women stone, because of these two bizarre rocks, locals decided to have museum on sex culture in the tourist complex to attract more tourists (thanks god! the museum is outside WHS zone). From the male stone, the bus took me to another gate which required fingerprint scan from every visitor! Then I went to another landmark of the park, the Zhanglao Peak or Elder Peak where I took cable car to the top of the peak.

On the peak, there is a beautiful forest with many lovely springs, pavilion, monasteries and hiking trails for tourists to discover, at first I planned to hike down the peak to Biechuan Buddhist Monastery, but after I visited Shaoyin Pavillion for an unbelievable beautiful view of Danxiashan, I had to give up my plan, hiking in August summer heat and high humidity was a real disaster and I was soaked with my sweat, and took the easy option of cable car. Then I took a river cruise on Jinjiang River, the view along the river was very breathtaking and high recommended. Then I took a bus back to the park entrance and walked back to casino for a bus to Shaoguan before took a high-speed train back to Guangzhou.

From my experience Danxiashan National Park is a nice place to visit and very easy to be there; the park scenic is truly lovely, from the tourist brochure I notices that my visited area is just a small part of the park, there are still many nice spots to see as well as many activities for tourist including bamboo rafting. But do not visit Danxiashan in summer like me, this area is really hot and uncomfortably humid, also there is almost no English information available, knowing some Chinese or Cantonese will be a great help. All in all, Danxiashan is another good World Heritage Site that China offered.