The place closest to heaven—Shangri-La
Shangri-La, the place closest to heaven, boasts beautiful scenery at an altitude of 3600-4200 meters. "Shangri-La" means "the sun and moon in one's heart" in Tibetan.
🔥 Transportation Guide🚙
✈️Plane: Direct flights to Diqing Shangri-La Airport, then transfer to a bus/public transport; or transfer via Kunming/Lijiang to reach by high-speed train/bus.
🚄High-speed train: Shangri-La station, then transfer to public transport/taxi to hotels and attractions (Kunming→Shangri-La, 4.5h).
🚘Self-driving (chartered car): Take the expressway, National Highway 214, or the Eastern Ring Road, with the Eastern Ring Road being the most scenic.
🔥 Attraction Recommendations
📍Potatso National Park
China's first national park, the place of Serteng revival, "Potatso" in Tibetan means to ferry all living beings to the other shore of suffering.
📍Baishuitai
China's version of "Cotton Castle," where the azure spring water💧 flows over naturally formed limestone terraces, Baishuitai is a natural wonder formed by the dissolution of calcium carbonate in the spring water. The spring water, containing calcium bicarbonate, flows slowly, and carbonates gradually precipitate, forming terraces over the years, resembling layered terraces.
📍Songzanlin Monastery
The largest Tibetan Buddhist monastery in the world, known as the "Little Potala Palace." It houses a large number of Buddhist relics and classic architecture.
📍Tiger Leaping Gorge
One of China's deepest gorges, hidden at the junction of Shangri-La and Lijiang, with Jade Dragon Snow Mountain on one side and Haba Snow Mountain on the other. During the rainy season from May to September, the river water rises rapidly, which is quite spectacular.
📍Dukezong Ancient Town
Known as the "Moonlight City Castle built on stone," it still retains the world's largest and highest prayer wheel, where you can walk clockwise around the prayer wheel three times.
📍Napa Lake
Napa Lake is not a sea but a seasonal highland lake, with Shangri-La's largest grassland, tranquil lakes, and majestic mountains, horses and lambs, and Tibetan dress photography is very photogenic📸.
📍Meili Snow Mountain Gang
Meili Snow Mountain is very close to Shangri-La, with the 'golden pagoda'-shaped main peak of Meili - Kawagebo Peak, the thirteen peaks of Meili, located at the confluence of the Jinsha River, Lancang River, and Nu River. It is said that those who see the sun shining on the golden mountain at Meili Snow Mountain will be lucky for the whole year, and the best season is autumn and winter. The Wunongding viewing platform is the best position to capture the panoramic view of Meili Snow Mountain.
📍Liangbeng
A place yearned for by many hiking enthusiasts, known as "hiking paradise." The last village in China to be electrified, Liangbeng is located at the foot of Meili Snow Mountain, and the sun shining on the golden mountain seen from Liangbeng village has a unique angle.
⚠️When entering Songzanlin Monastery, a Buddhist holy site, be sure to pay attention to your attire when visiting inside; do not wear short skirts, shorts, or sleeveless backless clothes. Photography is not allowed inside the hall, and remember to take off hats and sunglasses to respect local customs and culture.
🔥 Shangri-La Specialty Cuisine
🌟 Zongka Tibetan Meal
The yak meat hot pot ingredients are really good and delicious, very tender! The yak pizza amazed me, with a crispy crust and a very fragrant filling.
🌟 Mariga Tibetan Meal
It's like Tibetan dumplings filled with yak meat, really delicious when dipped in sauce.
🌟 Old Boy Barbecue
🍢 Their barbecue is quite flavorful, with delicious grilled meat skewers and grilled garlic.
🌟 Ama's Butter Tea
🧀 Butter milk cheese: With barley grains and cheese chunks on top, and yogurt below, stir it up, and the barley with yogurt is very fragrant.
🍮 Barley milk tea: With barley on top of the milk tea, the milk tea is not sweet, and it's very warming in the cold weather there.
🌟 Shunshun Snacks
🍜 Yak meat rice noodles: The beef is very fragrant, and the soup base is rich, not the clear soup type, with the addition of pickled cabbage and chili, you can't stop eating.
🍚 Yak meat fried rice: The fried rice is distinct, and when you take a big bite, it's super fragrant, and there's a lot of yak meat.
🥩 Yak meat buns: Their buns are super delicious!!! With large chunks of yak meat paired with green pepper filling, the presence of green pepper perfectly cuts through the richness, making it easy and burden-free to eat, really super fragrant.
Pudacuo Forest Park should be regarded as the largest scenic spot near Shangri-La, because we had to catch the train, we only stayed in it for more than two hours. After visiting the Shudu Lake, we didn't go to Bitahai again. Enter the scenic spot and take a sightseeing bus first. The bus takes a long time to get to the first stop of Duhu Lake, and then enter the 3.3 kilometer hiking, but it is basically a wooden plank road, so it is more convenient to walk. The temperature in Shangri-La at the end of April was still relatively low. Because there was no sun on a cloudy day, the rain the night before caused the scenic wind to be very strong. The meadow was still in a slightly green state, but the horse cattle were free to eat grass. It belongs to Duhu Lake and the virgin forest is still very beautiful, and some snow-capped mountains can be seen in the distance. There are many small squirrels in the virgin forest. They are not afraid of people and will beg for food. They are very cute. There are more than 4,000 meters above sea level. If the high reaction is serious, you should prepare an oxygen tank to suck it. At the end of Duhu Lake, the bus is to return to the gate of the scenic spot first. If you want to go to Bitahai, then take the bus. If you come to Pudacuo in summer, it should be more beautiful!
Pudacuo Forest Park should be regarded as the largest scenic spot near Shangri-La, because we had to catch the train, we only stayed in it for more than two hours. After visiting the Shudu Lake, we didn't go to Bitahai again. Enter the scenic spot and take a sightseeing bus first. The bus takes a long time to get to the first stop of Duhu Lake, and then enter the 3.3 kilometer hiking, but it is basically a wooden plank road, so it is more convenient to walk. The temperature in Shangri-La at the end of April was still relatively low. Because there was no sun on a cloudy day, the rain the night before caused the scenic wind to be very strong. The meadow was still in a slightly green state, but the horse cattle were free to eat grass. It belongs to Duhu Lake and the virgin forest is still very beautiful, and some snow-capped mountains can be seen in the distance. There are many small squirrels in the virgin forest. They are not afraid of people and will beg for food. They are very cute. There are more than 4,000 meters above sea level. If the high reaction is serious, you should prepare an oxygen tank to suck it. At the end of Duhu Lake, the bus is to return to the gate of the scenic spot first. If you want to go to Bitahai, then take the bus. If you come to Pudacuo in summer, it should be more beautiful!
One of the toll items in the park is to go out to the Duhu District Station. One of the other alternatives is about 3km lakeside trails. The boat journey is about 20 minutes. The cruise has an upper sightseeing deck. The experience between the lake and the mountains is good.
The highest point in Pudacuo National Park is 4,670 meters above sea level, and the lowest point is 2,347 meters above sea level. There are many unique small scenery staggered distributions such as fault cliffs, forest small mounds, deep ditch canyons, including relatively primitive and complete forest shrubs, alpine meadows, wetland lakes, geological relics, River Canyon Ecosystems, etc.
Tickets are a bit expensive, but the scenery and trees of the scenic spot are really good. Be sure to buy sightseeing car tickets, because there are a few kilometers of hiking scenery inside that is beautiful and it is recommended for everyone to take a walk.
Pudacuo is on the plateau. It was too early to go in April. It was basically dry yellow before spring. At least go after May. And the core scenic area ecology has been closed, it has been closed for 5 or 6 years, and it is still not open. Many people at 3000+ altitude will have altitude sickness. Buy more oxygen cylinders when you go. The scenery is a relatively primitive plateau lake, the prototype of Shangri-La, and the main one is quiet and native. People who like it will like it very much. Personal feelings are average. Maybe the season is not right.
A Shangri-La National Forest Park that is very worth visiting. The park has arranged landscape cars to save the hard work of hiking. The landscape cars are arranged in an orderly manner. There are also many cars. The vegetation in the park is rich like a natural oxygen bar. It is like a big one in the blue sky. The sapphire, Bita Sea is also very quiet, the lake is sparkling under the breeze, the lake is still inhabited by many birds, there are a few yaks in the meadow to eat grass, a few squirrel spirits in the snow pile are flexible walking, really a peaceful and comfortable scene.
Fortunately, when I went out of Shangri-La, I met volunteers to issue free tickets for Pudacuo. I first reported 8 people on Trip.com, and then three soldiers in the family were free of tickets. The other three used coupons. The children were free of charge and one half price. The difference was refunded. It is worth playing. The winter scenery has a special flavor, the eyes are in paradise, the staff will explain a paragraph, the experience is much better than Songzanlin and Jade Dragon Snow Mountain.