Dazu Rock Carvings

UNESCO World Heritage Site (1999); National 5A Tourist Attraction · Chongqing, Chongqing

Tens of thousands of painted stone figures carved into the red sandstone hillsides of Dazu, west of Chongqing, between the late 9th and 13th centuries - the last great flowering of cave-temple art in China and a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1999. Unlike the earlier grottoes of northern China, Dazu blends Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism and fills its cliffs with scenes of everyday life: farmers, herdsmen, drunkards, mothers nursing babies and sinners punished in vivid hells. At Baodingshan, the monk Zhao Zhifeng spent some seventy years from 1174 creating the Great Buddha Bend, a horseshoe-shaped gorge lined with a 31-metre reclining Buddha entering nirvana, a gilded Thousand-Armed Guanyin, a great Wheel of Rebirth, ox-herding parables and a Cave of Full Enlightenment lit by a shaft of daylight, all cleverly engineered with drainage channels that still carry water today. Beishan, closer to town, holds more refined earlier carvings, including the Wheel of the Law cave, often called the pearl of Chinese cave art, and opens for night visits.

Baodingshan Scenic Area, Baoding Town, Dazu District, Chongqing, Chongqing, China

Daily about 8:30-18:00, last entry about 16:10. Beishan night visits about 19:30-23:00. Hours can change seasonally.

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