14 Days in Chuxiong

The prefecture museum sets out Yi history and bronze drums; the old Confucian temple stands a few streets east; Yiren Ancient Town, built in the mid-2000s, fills with food stalls and dance in the evening — the Torch Festival falls on the 24th day of the sixth lunar month.

1. chuxiong museum
2. chuxiong confucius temple
3. chuxiong yiren ancient town

The calendar park marks the traditional ten-month year of 36-day months with its observation courts; the wooded Eluo hill on the town's west side gives the city a first look from above.

1. chuxiong solar calendar park
2. chuxiong eluo park

Twenty kilometres northwest, Zixi's pine forest sits around 2,500 m with old camellia trees and hillside temple halls; trails loop between the ridges for an unhurried half-day.

1. chuxiong zixi mountain

An hour east at Lufeng, the park opened in 2008 around an in-situ hall where Early Jurassic skeletons some 180 million years old still lie in the rock; the walkways and museum wing take most of a day.

1. chuxiong world dinosaur valley

A deep valley town in Lufeng, often called a thousand-year salt town — Ming and Qing merchant houses line the Longchuan river, with the old salt wells and the Wu family courtyard open to visitors; an overnight in the valley is worth the quiet.

1. chuxiong heijing ancient town

Two hours north to Yuanmou County, where two fossil teeth found in 1965 at Shangnabang defined Yuanmou Man, dated to about 1.7 million years; sleep in Yuanmou town.

1. chuxiong yuanmou man site
2. chuxiong yuanmou museum

Clay towers eroded into castles and columns at the Wumao and Langbapu sites, an hour's drive apart; late light gives them their colour, and a night in Yuanmou keeps the pace easy.

1. chuxiong yuanmou tulin

The ridge above Wuding carries the Zhengxu temple courts, where tradition says a Ming emperor found refuge in the early 1400s, and a spring display of thousands of peony plants; the drive back toward Chuxiong takes about 1.5 hours.

1. chuxiong wuding lion mountain

Two hours northwest to Dayao County, where the Shiyang salt-well town keeps a temple to Confucius with an early-18th-century bronze statue about 2.3 metres tall; the old well lanes and stele yards fill a slow day.

1. chuxiong shiyang ancient town

A rest day in town — morning markets for Yi embroidery, mushrooms in season and mountain honey, then an easy loop of the old town quarter as the day cools.

1. chuxiong city markets
2. chuxiong yiren ancient town

An honestly labelled neighbouring-prefecture day — the rail link opened in July 2018 puts Dali about an hour west; the walled old town and the shores of Erhai Lake fill the day, with the evening train back.

1. chuxiong dali ancient town

The second honest neighbour day — the Stone Forest in Kunming-administered Shilin County is karst pillars sculpted over some 270 million years, listed by UNESCO in 2007; the evening train returns along the line.

1. chuxiong kunming shilin

A slow last day — tea houses on the old town's main drag, a last look at the bronze-drum square, and packing with the evening market as a farewell dinner.

1. chuxiong yiren ancient town
2. chuxiong city markets

Breakfast from the market, then the train — Kunming under an hour westbound, Dali about an hour the other way, both by the rail link.

1. chuxiong city markets