Shaxi Guide

You are in Sideng and the valley around it, a historic market town in Jianchuan County, Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan, not in Dali Old Town and not in Lijiang Dayan. The town sits roughly halfway between Dali and Lijiang. The county seat of Jianchuan is about 50 kilometres south-west of Lijiang and about 120 kilometres north of Dali; those are county figures, and the town is in that county. The town itself sits 32 kilometres from the county seat, on 288 square kilometres. The postcode is 671302.

Sideng market square was added to the World Monuments Watch list of 100 Most Endangered Sites in 2001. The town was a tea and horse trading point from the Tang dynasty (618 to 907), with its height in the Ming and Qing (1368 to 1912). Sideng is often called the only surviving ancient market on the tea-horse road. A preservation project has run since 2002 as a cooperation between ETH Zürich and the People's Government of Jianchuan County, under a rule of repairing old as old, with as little intervention as possible.

Nearby Shibao mountain, also called Shizhong, holds Buddhist rock carvings and temples of more than 1,300 years, including images of the bodhisattva Guanyin. The Shizhong grottoes date to the Nanzhao and Dali kingdoms. Xingjiao Temple is a national heritage site, a Ming temple with murals. The two main ethnic groups are Bai and Yi. Bai people are about 84 percent of the town population.

You come to walk Sideng square, to see the old caravan fabric of the town, and to go up to the grottos if the day is clear. Dali has the old-town night and the lake. Lijiang Dayan has the day-trip crowd. Sideng has a stone square and a valley. The difference is geographic, not a ranking.

One full day covers the square, the lanes, and Xingjiao Temple. Two days fit if you add Shibao mountain. A third day makes sense only with another village in the valley. A week spent only in Sideng is a long small-town stay. The main village can be toured on foot.

Direct buses from Dali and from Lijiang exist now, about two hours. Older notes described a change in Jianchuan. Confirm the service the week you travel. Do not treat a fare table as current. There is no passenger railway in the town. Treat the last kilometres as that bus, a taxi, or a car you have checked.