China's Most Famous National Park: Zhangjiajie

When you look up the most popular tourist destinations within China, Zhangjiajie, the national park that inspired the landscape in the film Avatar, is usually in the top 10. As soon as you see photos of the park you can immediately understand why - the tall, thin karst towers surrounded by morning mists look like something dreamed up by a fantasy illustrator. The scenery is incredibly beautiful. That said, I wouldn't necessarily recommend visiting this park.

We traveled to Zhangjiajie last summer (August 2019) with Anna's family while they were visiting us in China. We went directly to the city of Changsha from Guilin, where we'd just spent a few gloriously peaceful days in the Longji Rice Terraces. From Changsha we caught a train and then a local bus to Wulingyuan, the small town located at one of the entrances to the park. The town has plenty of food and hotel options, ranging from inexpensive to high end, and lots of souvenir shops, massage parlors, and so on to cater to tourists. 

The park itself feels like visiting Disneyland but with even fewer opportunities to just walk around and a lot less charm. The landscape is incredibly beautiful and unique, however, the design of the park really ruins the experience. From the moment you get your ticket, you're funneled into one line after another, with buses shuttling you between scenic spots and very few trails allowing you to simply walk and avoid the lines. Some of the bus journeys are as short as a few kilometers, but you are still forced to spend up to an hour or two in a line just travel that distance. Add to that the cultural difference in China in which many people cut in lines or push their way to the front and you end up with a pretty awful day of crowds, frustration, and very few chances to just enjoy being in nature.

Long lines for the park buses, especially at the end of the day

The trail along Golden Whip Stream, although very crowded at the beginning, is actually one of the quietest parts of the park once the number of people thin out. It has great views of the stone pillars from below and is especially nice either in the morning or evening to avoid the heat of midday. It eventually takes you to a nice park area, but you will need to walk back along the trail to get to a bus stop that will return to the Wulingyuan entrance. The trail is very flat and easy, and probably takes about an hour one way. The monkeys along the trail are fun to watch, but be careful - they love to steal snacks away from tourists.

 

To see the some beautiful views of the mountains from above, it's probably worth the long lines and the extra fee to take the cable car up to Tianzi Mountain. The cable car ride alone is worth the price, with spectacular scenery the whole way up. At the top, there's just a small area to walk around and take some photos before you have to get in another line for a bus to go a few kilometers down the road to the next scenic area. The second stop along the road had some of the best views that I found with the smallest crowds. 

One of the "less crowded" scenic spots...

I personally would suggest avoiding the most popular scenic spots, like Bailong Elevator, First Bridge in the World, the glass bridge (in another park near Wulingyuan, not in the main park). No matter how great the view is, you will probably not be able to enjoy it when there are dozens of people waving selfie sticks in your face and shoving their way to the front to get a photo. 

So, to wrap up, I really didn't feel like Zhangjiajie was worth the time and money that we spent on it. It might be more worthwhile if you're able to travel there during the off season, but honestly the changes that have been made in the last 5-10 years to the design of the park have really ruined it in my opinion. It's extremely difficult to move through the park without spending hours in lines or on buses, and very hard to escape from the huge crowds. Even in the town you cannot get away from bus loads of tour groups with leaders shouting into megaphones non-stop.

In my experience traveling in China, the lesser-known the destination, the better it will be. Places like Shaxi Ancient Town in Yunnan or some of the smaller villages in the Guangxi rice terraces are far better places to enjoy nature and get some peace and quiet.