Fenghuang

Located in the Xiangxi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, the town takes its name from a mountain to its southwest that resembles a phoenix. It boasts many age-old buildings and natural scenes. It is also the birthplace of many luminaries, including the famous writer Shen Congwen and painter Huang Yongyu.

Ancient brick-and-wood buildings line old streets by the river. Shop signs and advertisements, ubiquitous elsewhere in the world, are virtually absent here. Most families leave their doors and windows open, and show no annoyance at tourists inquisitively peeping in. Actually, some local grannies and kids watch passing tourists with the same interest that the tourists show in them.

Another unique feature of the ancient town are stilted houses in exotic Miao style at Huilongge. Dating back to the late 18th and early 19th centuries, all the buildings are wood column-and-tie structures of two stories. The spacious upper floor demonstrates intricate workmanship, which is most in evidence in the finely carved rails, windows and doors.

Fenghuang is also known for the Southern Great Wall. Its construction lasted from the late Ming (1368-1644) to the Qing (1644-1911), its function was to keep out ethnic peoples such as the Miao. The wall, built of locally quarried stone on the surface and filled in between by gravels and earth, snakes along mountain ridges and across steep valleys from Tongren in Guizhou to Baojing in Hunan. Its has in total 1,232 emplacements, checkpoints, watchtowers, garrison sites, gateways and numerous caserns. It served the same defensive functions as its better-known northern counterpart.