Dec 182008
 

On December 20th of 2006, I received an e-mail from my dad. It contained this Powerpoint file.

The forwarding messages all included such phrases as:
“I CANT EVEN LOOK AT THE PICTURES WITHOUT GETTING DIZZY!!”
“NOT A CHANCE IN HELL”, and
“HOLY SH*T!”

I took a look. And immediately knew that someday, I would stand atop that mountain. I didn’t even know the mountain’s name. Just that I had to climb it.

Almost exactly two years later, I found myself sitting with my buddy Andy on a rickety old bus winding up a small mountain road with sheer rock faces on both sides. An old Chinese man sat in the front singing religious hymns as we stared out the window wondering what we’d gotten ourselves into.

We were on our way to the base of Huashan – one of China’s 5 sacred peaks and supposedly the most dangerous tourist hiking trail in the world. It took several hours to reach the mountain from Xi’an, the nearest big city – due mainly to the fact that the once-daily bus departs “whenever it’s full,” which could be as early as 7am or as late as…any time.

We got there early and waited.

Then it was a quick cablecar ride up to the starting point of our journey.

During the planning stages for this trip – mostly via E-Mail – Andy and I had concerns about making the climb so late in the year. Not only would ice on the trail make for a much riskier ascent, but the cold weather would make gripping the metal handholds much more difficult…not to mention the negative effect thick fog would have on any potentially breathtaking photos we hoped to obtain. But as it turned out, the Gods were with us that day and the weather was just PERFECT.

The scenery was spectacular, so we took our time climbing the thousands – if not tens of thousands of steps to the first three of five peaks.

But the more time that passed, the more concerned we became that we might have somehow missed the infamous “plank path.” Quite different from the linear one-path hike we expected, Huashan had a network of rock staircases branching out in every direction – making it easy to miss a given section altogether.

Many of these staircases were so vertical that our backpacks felt like they were trying to tug us right off the mountain, while others were relatively flat…with sheer drops for hundreds of meters on either side. But despite all the views and vertical craziness…what we really wanted was to traverse the planks.

Then we saw it.

Man, was it ever crazy.

First, you descend a vertical “staircase” made of little more than a few chunks of rebar stuck between a split in the rock. Each step was barely two inches in diameter, the drop below over a kilometer.

Then, after manipulating your way around a short bend, you see the start of a rickety path made of rotting wooden planks jammed right onto the face of Huashan.

…Over the path you go…

Until someone comes along in the other direction, and you have no choice but to let them pass (!!)

And just as you think you’ve finally reached the end, it gets yet a little bit crazier:

Small footholds carved into the rock.

As you can probably tell, the world’s most dangerous tourist hike did not disappoint.

But now we had ourselves a slight problem. We’d spent so long taking photos (hey, we did travel hundreds of miles just for this!) that the sun was starting to set, and it looked like we wouldn’t have time to reach the fourth and fifth peaks before the tram down the mountain would close.

We decided to go for it anyway, scrambling upwards as fast as we possibly could, then sprinting back down.

By the end of the hike our legs were so fatigued we could barely walk, and all we could think about was (in my case) a bed and (in Andy’s case) an hour-long massage.

Luckily, even though we did indeed miss the last tram, the staff was still there – and started it back up just for us – saving an additional few hours of hiking.

Unluckily, by the time we got to the bottom it was already well after sunset – and there were no more buses into town. We got stuck making the 7km walk to Huashan village on foot. In the dark.

An hour or so later, an approaching taxi flashed its headlights in the distance. We told the driver we were trying to get back to Xi’an. He called his friend, the bus driver, who just happened to be RIGHT about to hop on the freeway back to Xi’an.

The driver wanted 40 kuai to drive us to the bus. We told him to use the meter. He refused, eventually agreeing on 20. He then proceeded to SPEED his way towards the bus, flying past a cop car on the wrong side of a double-yellow line. “What are the cops even for,” I asked Andy. “To extract bribes from people of course,” he replied.

We reached the bus and the taxi’s meter read 30, but the driver accepted the agreed-upon amount without a word of protest.

As we boarded the completely full bus, it became apparent that the driver had been waiting there just for us. We paid the 30 kuai ticket fare and made it back to Xi’an just two hours after the official bus would’ve arrived – having conquered the plank path and all five peaks of Huashan.

That was one lucky day.

Time to give my legs a rest.

In case you missed it, HERE is a video clip of our hike up Huashan.

FAQ

Q: Was it really as crazy as it looks?
A: Yes.

Q: How did you manage to get those photos?
A: I attached the camera to my wrist with a small bungee, so I could drop it if needed.

Q: Did you have a harness?
A: Sort of. There were two straps of questionable reliability that we used to fasten ourselves to the face as we shimmied across (see photo to the left). However, they had to be frequently removed and replaced as we made our way down the path – and during the vertical sections, there were often multiple-meter drops during which the system would do nothing (if you lost your balance, you’d fall to the next point where the chain attaches to the rock. It’s a bit tough to describe…)

  24 Responses to “Huashan: The Danger Trail”

  1. Unbelievable

    Nice sightseeing, however far to scary for me

    How many dead tourist every year?

  2. I dunno, but was wondering that myself actually – I’ve read in a number of places that there HAVE indeed been plenty of deaths…but have never found an actual figure.

  3. Hm, yeah, there’s something I’ll never do.

  4. Wus πŸ˜‰

  5. These photos inspire some major puckering . . .

  6. Puckering…?

  7. The bus back to xi an was FULL of people waiting for us….like 20 or 30 people. They waited maybe ten minutes for the two of us. When we got on, the bus immediately left, and I heard the other people bitching about how they had to wait for the two idiot foreigners to arrive. We then each paid 2 kuai less than everyone else on the bus had already paid because that is what the taxi driver had told us. This made the people who were waiting even angrier. Not only did they all have to wait for us, but they then all paid more than we did πŸ™‚ CRAZY! A v*e*r*y lucky day. Everything seemed to work out….the weather, the bus out, the lack of snow / ice, the lack of fog, temperatures that were near perfect, getting them to run the cable car down after they had already shut down, finding a taxi driver who was able to get in touch with the bus and having it wait, etc. Very good day!

  8. And btw….that last pic of me is called the superman….no hands and fully leaning back over the abyss….100% trusting the equipment. If anything failed….certain DEATH

  9. So how do u think this post went? Decent selection of pictures? πŸ™‚

  10. Not bad at all…..could have used more photos of us ON the plank path tho

  11. puckering in fear… think about what puckers..

  12. […] reading this particular blog about a computer programming that does a lot of traveling. There is a specific post about a pretty cool mountain trail this guy completed called Mt. Huashan (picture to the left […]

  13. looks dangerous,but it is safe ,it is one of sacred mountains in china,near xi’an,shaanxi,hope you enjoy it

  14. Haha…safe, unless you happen to lose your footing!! πŸ˜›

  15. I would love to go here, do you have any tips on how to get here? What would be the best way? I will be all over china this summer and would also like to take this hike.

  16. Not really – it was pretty easy to be honest, just a direct early-morning bus from Xi’an right in front of the train station πŸ™‚

  17. Well Justin,

    Four months after first seeing this post, I am here. In Xi’an, China. Preparing for tomorrow to go hike the Dangerous Trail of Huashan. Thanks for the inspiration .

    – Anthony

  18. Awesome! Have fun πŸ˜€

  19. http://www.redrif.com/2011/10/10/the-most-dangerous-hiking-trail-in-the-world-7-pics/
    Found this via a friend.. thought you might want to go here as well !:)

  20. Wow, pretty cool – I’ll definitely keep it in mind! Although sadly, I fear that by the time I get there it may be nothing like those photos (“Work is now due to start on an 8.3 million project to make the pathway safe again and attract more tourists to the area”) 😐

  21. I love this cool travel journal! The pictures are great!
    Best regards,
    Alex

  22. Thanks! Glad you’re enjoying it πŸ™‚

  23. Hi there..
    Im going to conquer Mount Huashan next month..can’t wait dude !
    Did you do any training/exercise before climbing that mountain..? I never hiking before and this is my first time climb a mountain..
    Tq

    • >>Did you do any training/exercise before climbing that mountain..?

      Not specifically for this, but I do long hikes / cycling / lifting all the time, so I guess you could say I’m “always” training.

 Leave a Reply

(required)

(required)


(required)

Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. You can also subscribe without commenting.

Contact | Terms & Privacy
©2004-2025 Justin Klein
whos online
Feedburner
HTML5 Valid
02-16-2025 18:19:51UTC 0.34s 72q 31.71MB