Yajishan Temple Fair, 2015/05/20
Photos from our Yajishan Temple Loop hike and the annual – and rowdy! – temple fair.
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Every year there’s a weeklong temple fair at the village below Yaji Mountain—a little like the temple fairs during Spring Festival in Beijing city, but with a much more rural flavour. It’s a popular fair amongst the local inhabitants and gets really busy, with visitors from the surrounding countryside all crowding in for the fun.
We headed out to take a look at what was happening.
Before visiting the fair, we hiked up to the temples on top of Yaji Mountain – a fairly tough climb up a whole lot of stairs. On the way to the top we passed by some of the smaller temples on the way up and they were all busier than usual, with people burning incense and praying for good fortune.
Around the back of the temples is a semi-secret trail that we love to walk. As well as getting great views of the temples from a different angle, the mountain scenery is excellent.
After finishing the hike, we took a look at the fair. The streets of the village – normally rather quiet – were filled with stalls selling all sorts of stuff, from super-stinky tofu and lamb skewers, to swords and other weird knick-knacks. Ever thought of having a cucumber facial, or a photo with a monkey and peacocks? You could have had either at the temple fair here.
See the photos from the hike and the fair below!
Approaching the start of the climb up to the temples.
The start of a long climb – and this was just the first set of stairs.
Looking back from about halfway up the first set of stairs, with the big Yin and Yang symbol in the courtyard below.
The temple at the top of the first set of stairs.
The views got better the higher we went. We started the walk in the village seen below.
Lanterns line one of the last sets of stairs.
A view from the temples at the very top.
After a short walk into the hills we were able to see the temples from the other side.
We spotted a wee lizard scurrying about. They’re most active in the hot weather at this time of year.
The trail took us down through a forest, and it was great to have a bit of shade from the hot sun.
Another view of the impressive hilltop temple.
We followed this dirt trail back to the village.
Streetside stalls.
We walked through the back of the village to get to the main area of the fair.
Busy, and this was only a Wednesday! It would get far busier on the weekend.
Crowds at the fair.