Henan Province travel guide

Zhengzhou · 2–4 hours

"Kang Baiwan" ("Kang the Millionaire") was the title bestowed by Empress Dowager Cixi on the Kang Yingkui family. This manor is a representative example of fortified feudal architecture on the Loess Plateau in the 17th and 18th centuries. Its exterior is simple and solid, while its interior is lavishly decorated, combining features of North China and Loess Plateau residences. Its jade, wood and brick carvings are outstanding and are hailed as a wonder of Central Plains art.

Luoyang · 2–3 hours

More than 1,900 years ago, a white horse carried Buddhist scriptures and a statue of Shakyamuni to this spot, a journey whose hardships are hard to imagine. The temple was named White Horse Temple in commemoration of the horse’s labour in carrying the scriptures. It was the first temple built by the government after Buddhism entered China, and it has long been revered as the “ancestral court” (zuting) and “source of Buddhism” (shiyuan) of Chinese Buddhism. The temple preserves more than 40 stone steles dating from the Tang dynasty onward, the most precious of which is the Record of the Ancestral Court of White Horse Temple in Luojing, inscribed by the Yuan-dynasty calligrapher Zhao Mengfu. The Great Hall (Daxiong Hall) is the grandest and most splendidly decorated hall in the temple. Here you can see original Yuan-dynasty sculptures of the Three Buddhas, the Two Heavenly Generals and the Eighteen Arhats. About 200 metres south-east of the temple’s mountain gate stands Qiyun Pagoda, one of the few surviving Jin-dynasty architectural monuments in the Central Plains and among the oldest ancient buildings still standing in China.