Guizhou · The Waterfall You Can Walk Behind
Huangguoshu Falls (黄果树瀑布)
A limestone river that drops off a cliff in Guizhou, with a natural passage running through the rock behind the water. The Ming traveller Xu Xiake wrote it up in 1638 and it has been on the route ever since.
Quick Facts
The Short Version
| What it is | A waterfall on the Baishui river in western Guizhou, with a cave passage running behind the falling water that visitors can walk through |
|---|---|
| Where | Zhenning, about 45 minutes from Anshun and two hours from Guiyang by road |
| Size | Commonly published as roughly 78 metres high and 100 metres wide. The width varies enormously with the season, so any single figure is a snapshot |
| Why it is known | Xu Xiake, the Ming traveller whose diaries are a standard reference for the geography of his period, described it in 1638. It has been a fixed point on routes through Guizhou since |
| Booking | One ticket covers three separate sites. Buy at the gate or online. Shuttle buses between the three are included; the escalators are not |
| Time needed | A full day for all three sites. Half a day if you only want the main falls |
| Terrain | Steps, wet stone and a lot of them. The cave passage behind the water is slippery by definition |
| Language | Signage is bilingual at the main gates and thins out quickly inside |
Why Go
Water, and the Hole Behind It
1. The passage behind the falls
The cave that runs through the cliff behind the water is the thing that separates this from every other large waterfall. It is a natural passage with a series of openings that look straight out through the falling water, and the path inside it is open to visitors. Standing in one of those openings puts the whole weight of the river a metre away on the other side of a moving wall of water.
Everything about it is wet. Spray comes through the openings, the floor is slick, and in high summer the noise makes conversation pointless. Raincoats are sold at the entrance and they are not a tourist tax.
2. It is three sites, not one
The ticket covers the main falls, a second waterfall upstream at Doupotang, and a karst park called Tianxingqiao with stone pillars standing in shallow water and a suspension bridge over the gorge. Most foreign visitors come for the first and leave without seeing the third, which is a mistake: Tianxingqiao is where the limestone country that produced the waterfall is actually legible.
Doupotang is the one Chinese visitors photograph, because the 1986 television version of Journey to the West used it in the title sequence. It is worth twenty minutes on the way through.
The catch. The water is brown from May to October. Sediment load peaks with the flow, so the months with the most water are the months with the least colour. Winter gives clear green water over a much thinner curtain. There is no season that gives both.
Orientation
Three Sites, One Ticket, One Long Day
The three parts sit along a few kilometres of the same river and the shuttle runs between them. Doupotang is furthest upstream, the main falls in the middle, Tianxingqiao downstream. Doing them in that order works and puts the main falls in the middle of the day.
The main falls site is a loop: down to the viewing platforms, along to the cave entrance, through the passage, and back up. The climb back out is long enough that the escalator sells itself, and it is charged separately. Tianxingqiao is a linear walk of about an hour and a half with the bridges at the far end.
Practical
Things Worth Knowing
Take the raincoat seriously
The cave passage puts spray on everything, cameras included. A cheap poncho over a dry bag is the arrangement that works. Phones in pockets come out wet.
Shoes with grip
Wet limestone and wet steps, in quantity. This is the site where the footwear advice is actually load-bearing.
Budget for the escalators
Two of the three sites have long climbs and charge separately for the lift. Deciding in advance saves an argument at the bottom of the stairs when you are tired.
Come on a weekday if you can
This is one of the busiest sites in Guizhou and the cave passage is narrow. Weekday mornings move; weekend afternoons queue.
Timing
When to Go
| Season | The case for | The catch |
|---|---|---|
| June to August | Maximum flow. The falls are at full width and the noise inside the cave passage is the whole experience | The water is brown, the site is crowded, and it rains |
| September to October | Still strong flow with clearer air and better light on the karst | The first week of October is the national holiday and this site fills completely |
| April to May | Rising water, green everywhere, and the rice terraces on the approach roads are flooded | Rain is frequent and the karst park gets slippery |
| November to March | Clear green water, thin crowds, and the rock structure of the cliff is visible | A much smaller waterfall. In a dry winter the curtain breaks into separate strands |
Context
Why There Is a Waterfall Here at All
Western Guizhou is limestone that has been dissolving for a very long time. Rain takes carbonate into solution, water works down through joints in the rock, and the result is caves, sinkholes, underground rivers and pillars left standing where the rock between them has gone. The whole province reads as a landscape being quietly taken apart from the inside.
A waterfall in that setting is a stage in the process rather than a permanent feature. The cliff exists because the rock below it was removed faster than the rock above it, and the passage behind the water is a cave that the river opened and then cut into. Given enough time the lip retreats upstream and the falls move with it.
Xu Xiake walked through here in 1638 and left the earliest detailed description. He was travelling on foot with no institutional backing, keeping a diary that became the reference work on the physical geography of Ming China. The account he wrote of this waterfall is recognisably the same place.
Nearby
Other Stops on the Same Trip
Spot · 40 km
Longgong Caves (龙宫)
An underground river system near Anshun that visitors travel by boat, through flooded galleries in the same limestone. The inside of the process the waterfall is the outside of.
Spot · 108 km
Qingyan Ancient Town (青岩古镇)
A walled Ming garrison town on the approach to Guiyang, built of the local stone and still laid out on its original grid.
Spot · 139 km
Baili Azalea (百里杜鹃)
A long belt of wild rhododendron forest in Bijie that flowers through late March and April and is fairly quiet for the rest of the year.
Where to Base
Anshun (安顺)
Anshun is the practical base: about 45 minutes from the gate, with a high-speed rail station on the Guiyang line and enough hotels to make an early start possible. Staying here rather than in Guiyang buys the first hour at the falls before the day buses arrive, which on this site is worth more than it sounds.
The city is also the way into the rest of western Guizhou: the Longgong cave system, the Tunpu villages descended from Ming garrison settlers, and the road west toward Bijie. See karst landscapes for how the whole region fits together.
Experiences
What You Can Actually Do Here
On site · 1 hr
Walk the passage behind the water
A natural cave through the cliff with openings looking out through the falls. The one part of the site that cannot be photographed into a substitute for going.
On site · 90 min
The karst park at Tianxingqiao
Stepping stones between limestone pillars standing in shallow water, then bridges over the gorge below. Quieter than the falls and better for understanding the geology.
Guided · full day
Falls, caves and the Ming garrison villages
The waterfall in the morning, Longgong or a Tunpu village in the afternoon, with someone who can explain why a Ming garrison population is still culturally distinct here.
Worth a full day, and worth timing. Come in late September or October for the best combination of flow and light, or in winter if you would rather see clear water and have the cave passage to yourself. Do not come for half a day and only see the main falls: the karst park is the half that explains the other half.
Plan a Guizhou Route That Includes Huangguoshu
Tell us your dates and what you are after, and our local team will build the route: the falls and the passage behind them, the karst park most visitors skip, and the cave systems and garrison villages around Anshun.