Visiting Shanxi can be like stepping back through 2,000 years of, often turbulent, history. Although it is developing as rapidly as the rest of the mainland, the central province is home to many ancient temples and shrines, and the country's newest Unesco World Heritage site, the sacred Wutaishan (Mount Wutai). For hundreds of years, pilgrims and travellers have been spellbound by the serenity of this holy peak.
Home to the Bodhisattva Manjusri, the embodiment of enlightenment, Wutaishan is one of Buddhist China's four sacred mountains (the others being mounts Emei, Jiuhua and Putuo). There were once 200 temples stretching in a broad arc around the village of Taihuai - of the 108 remaining, 47 are open to visitors.
From provincial capital Taiyuan, the road to Wutaishan winds northeast through increasingly barren landscapes, twisting and turning upon itself like an enraged snake. Here, farmers still wear the old peasant uniform of peaked cap and drab Mao jacket. The road at Wutaishan's South Peak affords panoramic views across to some of China's greatest temples, clinging to the valley's slopes.
Emil S. Fischer, a journalist and diplomat living in Shanghai who visited Wutaishan in 1917, described his experiences in The Sacred Wu Tai Shan, published in 1925. He mentions staying overnight in Tayuan Temple, 'where the largest of all the White Bottle Pagodas stands'. Some 30 years later, in 1948, Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and other revolutionary leaders stayed briefly in the same temple. Amid the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, Taihuai villagers intervened and managed to prevent the Red Guards from destroying the temples.
The earliest temples here date back to AD68 and after the lifting of travel restrictions in 1985, the area has blossomed as a tourist destination; last year, Wutaishan played host to three million domestic tourists and 18,000 foreigners. A multilane highway set to open next year, reducing the travelling time from Beijing to a mere three hours - a far cry from the early 1900s when it took Fischer three days to reach the mountain - will help inflate those visitor numbers considerably.
An exploration of the temple complex could start at the Bodhisattva Summit's Pusading Temple, overlooking Taihuai. Pusading was built by Tibetan Buddhists between AD471 and AD499 at the behest of Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, founder of the Ming dynasty and a former monk, who was keen to get China's Tibetan and Mongolian minorities on side.
Pu-Sa-Ting or Pusading (meaning the abode of Manjusri) stuns all the senses at once. The brilliantly coloured figures of the temple's characters - the Medicine Buddha, Tara and Guru Padmasambhava and the Five Wrathful Deities - located in Vajra Hall, make a powerful impression and the rest of the day passes in a kaleidoscope of swirling colours, stories and sounds.