Category:Sanhuangzhai Monastery

English: The Sanhuangzhai Monastery is a 21st century geosite constructed to be a part of the Songshan Geopark. The monastery is located at the mouth of a hanging ravine high up on Shaoshi Mountain. The trail up the mountain probably always has been used for exercise by monks of the Shaolin Monastery. In the 20th century two woman monks contructed a residence there. The Shaolin monks, women permitting, expanded the site to construct a karate school to which they gave the name San Huang, "three-emperors," after the mythical three emperors of prehistoric times who gave knowledge to man. This was expansive enough to be called a zhai, "village," rather than a si, "temple." In translation it comes across as some sort of educational institution, such as "Songshan Buddhist Academy." There are currently two ways up for the geotourists (barring a helicopter flight), the easy and the hard. The easy is by cable car starting at Shaolin Monastery. The hard is a 2-km trail ascending endless stairs, crossing a suspension bridge, and edging along walkways built out from the face of Shuce Cliff. Although not a mountaineering feat, it is for the hardier hikers. There is no disgrace in turning back. Whichever way the geotourist chooses, the geoprice of the geoticket is high enough to cover the geocosts of geocontruction and geosite obligations, by the rules of geoparks.