5 Days in Jingmen

Start with the Guodian slips unearthed in 1993 — about 800 bamboo strips, roughly 2,300 years old, with the earliest manuscript Laozi — then walk up to the 1754 Longquan Academy under Xiangshan hill.

1. jingmen museum
2. jingmen longquan park

The UNESCO-listed Ming Xianling of 2000 covers 183 hectares and took over 40 years to lay out, its two burial mounds linked by a stone terrace. Stay for the evening lanes of Mochou Village next door.

1. jingmen xianling mausoleum
2. jingmen mochou village

The cave at Kedian runs about 2.5 kilometres beneath a mouth near 100 metres tall; rimstone pools line the passage and the exit faces the fields of Shuimeiping village in its sinkhole basin.

1. jingmen huangxian cave

Work began on the Zhanghe dam in 1958 — today the water spreads over roughly 100 square kilometres with a capacity above 2 billion cubic metres. Boats cross to the island landing stages west of Jingmen.

1. jingmen zhanghe reservoir

About 100 kilometres east, the Lülin mountains launched the uprising of AD 17 that gave Chinese its phrase for outlaw heroes. Walk the old stockade, raft Yuanyang Stream if the season allows, then return to Jingmen for evening trains.

1. jingmen lvlin mountain