Maijishan Grottoes

UNESCO World Heritage Site (Silk Roads: Chang An Tianshan Corridor, 2014); Cliff Grottoes On A Haystack Shaped Peak · Tianshui, Gansu

A cliff of Buddhist caves cut into a lone red sandstone peak in the forested hills east of Tianshui in Gansu, one of the four great grotto sites of China and part of the Silk Roads World Heritage listing. The mountain is named for its shape, a haystack rising abruptly from the trees, and into its almost vertical face carvers cut nearly two hundred caves between the fourth century and the Qing dynasty, reached now by a spider's web of walkways and stairs bolted to the rock, some of them two hundred metres above the ground. Because the sandstone is too coarse for fine carving, most of the figures here are modelled in clay over wooden frames, which makes them unusually lifelike: monks with individual faces, attendants caught mid-smile, and a famous group of bodhisattvas whose expressions have been called the gentlest in Chinese sculpture. Three colossal Buddhas dominate the eastern face, the largest more than fifteen metres tall. Climbing the walkways is part of the experience, and the walk out through the forest below is worth the extra hour.

Maijishan Grottoes, Maiji District, Tianshui, Tianshui, Gansu, China

Daily by timed booking, roughly 8:30-17:00 with seasonal variation (check); reopened August 20, 2026 after a weather closure.

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