Maling River

Overview

About

The Maling River scenic area lies between the Wumeng Mountains and the hills of Guangxi about 10 km east of Xingyi, capital of south-west Guizhou, 450 km² in all. Called the place of “a hundred waterfalls, a hundred curtains, a hundred springs”, it is known for its gorge fissure, travertine waterfalls and karst peak clusters, with cave systems and travertine “murals”, in three parts: the Maling Gorge, Wanfeng Lake and the Wanfeng peak forest. The Maling is a tributary of the Nanpan River rising at Baiguoling in the Wumeng Mountains; it is called the Qingshui in its upper course and the Maling in its middle course after the villages of Mabie and Maling.

Maling River Gorge

The gorge, 74 km², lies on the river 6 km east of Xingyi. It is a narrow fissure torn open by crustal movement 70 million years ago and deepened by the river: 74.8 km long, 200 to 400 m wide and deep on average, 50 m at its narrowest and 500 m at its deepest, with a fall of nearly 1,000 m. Because the many tributaries cut down more slowly than the main river, over a hundred waterfalls more than 100 m high plunge into the gorge. A 7 km walkway, the main section 1.7 km, allows visitors to explore on foot.

The Tianxing Gallery is the finest stretch, famous for its waterfall groups and hanging rock faces. The 9.7 km from the old Maling bridge to Tianxing bridge has 56 waterfalls, 36 flowing all year; the 1.7 km gallery alone has 13, among them the Ten Thousand Roaring Horses, Pearl, Veil, Intermittent Five-Tier, Moon-Scooping, Heart-Washing, Road Curtain and Flying Hall falls, 120 to 200 m high and 20 to 110 m wide. The water is heavy with calcium carbonate, which coats the cliffs in vast travertine waterfalls; the cliffs of the gallery alone carry over 300,000 m² of them.

The winding gorge with its many rapids is a fine place for rafting. It can be run all year, best from June to October when all 13 main waterfalls flow. Boarding rubber rafts at the Maling ferry, you pass the Chelang hot springs, the Five-Colour Gallery, the Tianxing Gallery and the Zhaojia ferry.

The Chelang hot springs lie upstream at the old Bouyei village of Chelang, one spring on each bank, the “Sons’ Spring” on the left and the “Daughters’ Spring” on the right, 38 to 40 °C, where Bouyei men and women have bathed facing each other across the river since ancient times. The 20 km from Longyin to Maling town is the “Five-Colour Gallery”.

The Wanfeng peak forest

The Wanfeng (“Ten Thousand Peaks”) area in the middle and lower gorge is a karst peak cluster: lone peaks ringed by clear streams, broad fields and scattered farmhouses. Xu Xiake wrote: “famous mountains under heaven are many, but only here do they form a forest of peaks; the sharp peaks stand apart, ranged like bamboo shoots.”

Wanfeng Lake

Wanfeng Lake is a reservoir behind the Tianshengqiao dam, 160 km² of water with over a thousand peaks rising from it, another Thousand Island Lake. A 50 km rafting route from the gorge to the lake links the three areas into one tourist line.

Other

The Maling area is rich in fossils of ancient marine reptiles.

In October 1999 a cable car fell in the scenic area, killing 14 and seriously injuring 20; those responsible were jailed. In November 2006 it was reported that work had begun on a hydro dam in the gorge that would seriously damage the scenery.