Today we visited the Three Natural Bridges National Geopark which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site located about 12 kilometres north of Wulong in Chongqing. The gorge here contains three large natural bridges as well as waterfalls and caves

Wulong became known due to Michael Bay's hit movie - Transformers: Age of Extinction, which directly shows the majesty beauty of the Three Natural Bridges in Wulong. There are two transformers in the Geopark. Some visitors believe they should be taken away as they detract from the beauty of the Heritage Park. I thought they were magnificent.

From a car park on the rim, we hopped into a glass elevator descending part way into the gorge, after which we walked down stairways through the largest opening of the three bridges, Sky Dragon Bridge (Tian Long). It has an estimated span of 160 feet and an estimated height of 310 feet. The buildings at the bottom of the stairways were built as a movie set for the 2006 film Curse of the Golden Flower starring Chow-Yun Fat and Gong Li.

The second bridge, Green Dragon (Qin Long), is a short walk downstream from the larger bridge. The span is estimated at 80 feet and the height is estimated at 330 feet. Looking at the bridge the shape looks like a machete. There is a great photo opportunity here. On the other side of this bridge it looks like a jumping carp.

The third bridge, Black Dragon (Hei Long), lies a short walk beyond the second bridge. There are weeping waterfalls within the opening. The span is estimated at 60 feet and the height is estimated at 380 feet.

The three natural bridges are situated in a 15 kilometre long gorge. They evolved due to tectonic uplift and the erosion by underground water. Some parts uplifted forming the bridges, and others collapsed to form karst pits. Therefore, the unique landscape of "Three Natural Bridges enclosed with Two Pits" is solely nature's creation.

We walked for 5kms up and down stairs, under waterfalls and over bridges admiring the beauty of the geopark.

We then made our way by bus to Longshuixia Fissures Gorge which is located in Xiannv Town and is 15km from the township. The gap was formed due to the orogeny tens of millions years ago. The gorge is 5kms long and its depth is from 200 - 500 metres, but we only walked a 2km trail through primitive forests, waterfalls, springs and gorges. This gorge was brilliant and the scenery was breathtaking.

It was getting late and the clouds were rolling in over the mountains and it started to rain. We made our way to a local restaurant for tea, I left because the locals were smoking inside and it was really dirty. About ten of us were going out to the Yinxiang Wulong Threatre to see the Impression Wulong show. The art advisor was Zhang Yimou of the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony fame. We were concerned that we would not see anything because it was an outdoor theatre and the rain was pelting down. We were assured that back up in the mountains the weather would be different.

We headed off up the mountain in our coach to the Peach Garden Canyon. The canyon is U-shaped with a depth of nearly 188m surrounded by unusually majestic mountains and ravines. The theatre had a stage stretching into the stand to allow for zero distance between the performers and the audience. A 288m-long man-made tunnel runs underground to the theatre from the outside of the canyon, dug to give the audience an unusual impression of the "heavenly pit and earth crack", so that the awaiting and unknowing audience, while walking inside, feel as if passing through a time tunnel, and all of a sudden are astounded to find a wholly different landscape.

This real-scene show features work songs sung to synchronize movement, which is on the verge of extinction. The show lasted for 70 minutes, and was about local customs, love stories, and traditional work and life scenes peculiar to Sichuan.

The female vocalists in China sound like cats……………………Meowwwwwwwwwww. The mountains lit up with a brilliant laser show synchronized to the dancing and singing. I enjoyed the production even though we were sitting in the rain with ponchos on and freezing cold. The concrete steps we sat on were very hard and cold to sit on. The actors must have been really cold also as most of the male cast were bare chested.

I was also annoyed that the local people talked, used their mobiles and put umbrellas up with no consideration to other spectators. Most left before the end of the performance which was poor as the show was good. We met up with Jessie and headed back down the mountain to our hotel. A few of us had drinks in the lobby.