Mount Tai

Mount Tai has been climbed as a ritual since long before the staircase existed, and the classic ascent from the Red Gate at Tai'an is a continuous flight of stone steps that takes most people four to six hours, past gateways, inscriptions carved into the rock and small shrines. The steepest section, the Eighteen Bends, ends at the South Gate to Heaven, where the summit ridge opens out to a temple complex and a row of plain guesthouses. A bus to the midway point and a cable car cut the climb to about an hour for anyone not set on walking. It is a mixed UNESCO site, listed for the mountain and for the carved and built layers on it.

History

Mount Tai has been a place of worship for at least 3,000 years, from the Shang to the Qing, and the worship grew into the Feng and Shan sacrifices, the imperial rite of paying homage to Heaven on the summit and to Earth at the foot. Under the Zhou, local lords came to bury food and jade offerings on the mountain, and Confucius criticised the ministers who usurped the right to sacrifice here; in the Warring States period the State of Qi built a 500-kilometre wall nearby, and in 219 BC Qin Shi Huang held a ceremony on the summit and proclaimed the unity of his empire in an inscription. More than 1,800 stone inscriptions survive on the mountain, among them over 800 steles, and it was made a World Heritage Site in 1987 (Wikipedia, Mount Tai).

The landscape

• The Eighteen Bends - the steepest staircase section, immediately below the summit gate.
• The rock inscriptions - carved characters cut into cliffs and boulders the whole way up.
• The South Gate to Heaven - the arch where the stairs end and the summit ridge begins.
• Sunrise from the Jade Emperor peak - the reason many people climb through the night.

When to go

Spring and autumn are best. Summer is hot and hazy, and winter ice makes the steps genuinely dangerous. For sunrise, either start walking around midnight or stay in one of the plain summit guesthouses. Book those well ahead, particularly during national holidays, when the staircase itself can back up into a standing queue.

What to expect

It is a relentless staircase and the day after is hard on the knees, with the descent worse than the climb. Summit accommodation is basic and expensive, and rented coats for sunrise are part of the routine. Haze often flattens the view completely, the summit ridge is crowded with stalls, and the cable car queue at closing time can run to an hour.

Nearby

Tai'an sits at the foot of the mountain, with Qufu about an hour south.

Key facts