Niangniangzhai

　　Exiting the Huangxian Cave, you’ll enter — Niangniangzhai. The scenic area features ancient trees towering above, undulating peaks covered in lush greenery, a cluster of karst caves, crisscrossing streams, and numerous deep pools. The mountains are blanketed with rare flowers and plants, vast groves of ancient ginkgo trees, the renowned high-mountain misty tea, as well as stone inscriptions and murals by Buddhist monks, Taoist priests, poets, and scholars. There’s also a mysterious village with an unchanged population and long-standing historical legends. All these elements make the Huangxian Cave–Niangniangzhai Scenic Area an ecotourism destination that blends natural ecology, history, and culture.

　　According to historical documents such as the Zhongxiang County Annals and the Daying Mountain Annals, Niangniangzhai has a history of over 2,000 years. Today, there remains one well-preserved ancient residential village and seven cultural heritage conservation sites.

　　Niangniangzhai Village is located within the Kedian Town of the Daying Mountain National Scenic Area, at the eastern foothills of Daying Mountain, at the junction of Suizhou, Jingshan, and Zhongxiang cities. It lies 70 kilometers from downtown Zhongxiang, at an elevation of 600 meters, stretching 4.26 kilometers from north to south and 2.45 kilometers from east to west.

　　The village has a total population of 128 people across 31 households, covering an area of 9.2 square kilometers. Forested land spans 12,000 mu, while arable land covers 140 mu. Its core settlement, Shuimoping, has 21 households and 78 residents, situated at the eastern foothills of the Shuimoping Basin. The houses are aligned in a row, covering a built-up area of 4,500 square meters.

　　Niangniangzhai Village boasts an excellent ecological environment, with a forest coverage rate as high as 93%. There are over 200 ancient trees aged over 500 years, 15 species of nationally protected trees including ginkgo, liriodendron, walnut, and nanmu, and 28 plant communities such as dioecious flowering ash, ancient ginkgo, ancient elm, and ancient pine. This rich ecological vegetation provides habitat for many rare animals, including leopards, giant salamanders, and pangolins — nine species under national first- and second-class protection.

　　Niangniangzhai features unique landforms. The residential area, Shuimoping, is a catchment basin primarily shaped by karst blind valleys and low karst hills, connected to the famous Huangxian Cave, forming a typical karst landscape. Surrounding areas also host karst caves such as Taohua Cave, Niubi Cave, Pigeon Cave, and Penzi Cave. The village is dotted with springs and streams, enjoys a pleasant climate year-round, with an average annual temperature of 12.3°C and rainfall of 1,268 mm. It has been acclaimed by authoritative experts as “an earthly paradise most suitable for human habitation.”

　　Niangniangzhai’s Unique Geological Culture

　　The basins, caves, and mountains in Niangniangzhai Village formed within over a thousand-meter-thick dolomite and dolomitic limestone of the Dengying Formation, deposited in the ocean 600 million years ago. Due to intense orogenic movements such as the Chengshan, Caledonian, Hercynian, Yanshan, and Himalayan movements, the rock layers underwent significant folding and fracturing, resulting in highly developed faults and joints. The southern mountainous area of the village mainly consists of Cambrian Dengying Formation limestone and dolomite, while the northern part features non-carbonate rocks such as purple-red gravel, conglomerate, and gray-green feldspar sandstone from the Early Sinian Period. According to UNESCO World Heritage criteria, experts from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Geography have confirmed that the geological culture of Niangniangzhai holds universal scientific significance, with extraordinary scale and attributes both globally and nationally. Notably, geological features such as the stone pool hall, calcite film edge dams, “Stone General” dissolution teeth, and the three-arch gate landform within the Huangxian Cave to Shuimoping cave system are exemplary cases of global geological and geomorphological events, drawing attention from geologists worldwide.

　　Numerous Ancient and Notable Trees

　　Niangniangzhai Village has four major scenic forests — 500 mu of moso bamboo, 5,000 mu of Chinese fir, 300 mu of maple forest, and 250 mu of ginkgo forest. It is home to nine nationally protected tree species: ginkgo, fragrant fruit tree, blue sandalwood, walnut, Davidia involucrata, liriodendron, magnolia officinalis, coptis, and eucommia. There are 216 ancient trees and two notable ancient tree clusters. The Chengzizhai ancient tree cluster mainly includes elm, hackberry, chestnut, coptis, and cypress. Among them, there are 89 elm trees, concentrated around an ancient Taoist temple, all over 350 years old, with two reaching 850 years. The largest has a diameter of 1.9 meters, the smallest 1.3 meters, and all stand over 20 meters tall. The Qianshuling ancient ginkgo cluster has 106 trees, all over 300 years old, including four millennia-old ginkgos with trunks about 2 meters in diameter and canopy like giant umbrellas.

　　Folk Legends

　　The Origin of Niangniangzhai

　　There are various beautiful and moving legends about the origin of Niangniangzhai. The main ones include: the legend that Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy, once descended here; the tale that the fourth wife of Emperor Taizong of Tang, Li Shimin, once led troops to fight the Sui army here; the story that relatives of Yang Guifei, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang’s consort, sought refuge here during turmoil; and the account honoring the sincere love of a newlywed bride.

　　The Origin of Shuimoping

　　Shuimoping, also known as Momoping, is the water inlet of Huangxian Cave. Originally a lake surrounded by mountains, it is said that Guangchengzi from the Investiture of the Gods once resided in Chengzizhai by the lake. To escape war, local people often took refuge here, gradually forming a village. Later, a tyrant moved into the village, calling himself “Huanghuazi,” and gathered a few cronies. They used the village’s only large boat to rob and harass nearby residents. Enraged, the villagers organized to capture “Huanghuazi,” but he fled to the middle of the lake by boat, leaving them helpless. They then prayed to Guangchengzi, who ordered a pangolin to bore through Huangxian Cave, draining the lake and capturing the tyrant. Once the lake was drained, fertile flatland emerged, hence the name Shuimoping (literally “Flooded Flat”). Due to its millstone-like shape, it’s also called Shuimoping (Water Mill Flat). Today, remnants such as Chengzizhai, Paoma Ridge, Jian Sword Tower, and Tuochuan Ya still remain.