One of the reasons I wanted to go to Luoyang, was because I read about the Longmen Grottoes. Actually, it was the only reason I wanted to go to Luoyang. Unfortunately I had to go to the Shaolin temple before coming here as there was no tour to just the Longmen Grottoes. In the end, I survived.
The grottoes, which overwhelmingly depict Buddhist subjects, are densely dotted along the two mountains: Xiangshan (to the east) and Longmenshan (to the west). The Yi River flows northward between them. For this reason, the area used to be called Yique (The Gate of the Yi River). From north to south, the distance covered by grottoes is about one km. Along with the Mogao Caves and Yungang Grottoes, the Longmen Grottoes are one of the three most famous ancient sculptural sites in China. There are over 2100 niches, more than 100,000 statues, some 40 pagodas and 3600 tablets and steles in the caves of Guyang, Binyang and Lianhua. (thanks wikipedia!)
A giant buddha carved in the rock.
a headless buddha in the room behind. many of the buddha heads were stolen to be sold around the world. Some are being brought back now to be reinstalled back on their original bodies.
The whole wall goes on for ages and really is quite massive and impressive.
another buddha
and another one
badd ass bodhisattva
those little brown triangle things are small buddhas. some areas had over a hundred of them all around and all carved from hand
Buddha and Bodhisattvas
I think this was the biggest buddha here. I used the chinese man there to give it some scale as to how massive it really is.
the chinese never really follow rules. sure there are fences and signs saying don't touch but they still do. So i turn the corner and see these two kids taking pictures in this hole so i take one as well. I'm supposed to be a buddha, though not as enlightened.
one of the two kids who I first saw hopping the fence. they really wanted to get a picture with me. who am i to say no :)
They call it the yellow river, but it looked more brown to me.
No comments:
Post a Comment