Longmen Caves in Hot Luoyang

Posted On August 4, 2013

After another great breakfast in Xiahe, it was time to leave this little gem. First, a bus brought us back to Lanzhou where we later onboarded a night train to Luoyang where we arrived a good 15 hours later. We shared our comfortable soft-sleeper compartment with a very friendly family and their two kids.

The first thing we noticed in Luoyang was the unbearable heat. The thermometer showed almost 37 degrees and we were happy that our hotel wasn’t too far away from the train station.

The next one and a half days were devoted to relaxing (in the air-conditioned room), eating and some minor shopping.

The reason for our visit to Luoyang was the Longmen Caves another UNESCO World Heritage Site. The site contains more than a hundred thousand Buddhas in hundreds of small caves and grottoes. Unfortunately, a lot of the statues were destroyed during the early twentieth century. Some statues were only a few centimetres high while others were over 20 meters huge. Truly an impressive sight. Have a look at some of the pics.

Besides the statues, there was a temple and even the summer residence of Taiwan-Founder Chiang Kai-Shek. And so we had, despite the mind-boggling heat of almost 40 degrees – a very nice afternoon.

The heat took its tool and so we decided to rest for another day before heading to Beijing (and we also couldn’t get any train tickets earlier – just crazy how fast the trains in China fill up).