Tianmen Mountain

Tianmen Mountain is a popular natural tourist attraction. It can be reached by the longest cable car in the world (2017) from the center of Zhangjiajie city.

We arrived in the evening and spent the night at the hotel Zhangjiajie Dachengshanshui International Hotel (booking.com). Good hotel in 3 kilometers from the airport and within walking distance from the cable car. Lower station is not yet marked on google.maps, so look for Tianmenshan Suodao Parking Lot.

The cable car is working from 7:30. Although we came to the opening, the queue was already quite large and mostly consists of Chinese tourist groups. We spent in the queue about two hours. If you do not have time choose a bus which takes you to the escalators, but it's clear that the cable car is much more interesting.




Zhangjiajie city is quite gloomy from above.




The cable car is long but fast.




The famous "serpentine" of 99 turns, used by shuttle buses.


At the top everything is simple: along the perimeter of the mountain, there is a hiking trail along which the mountain can be bypassed. In some places, you can use small cable cars and reach the temples at the very top.














In the distance is visible a part of the trail with a glass floor, which can be accessed for an additional fee.


The main attraction is the Tianmen Cave or 'Heaven's Door'. This is the most popular place.


World Wingsuit Championship was held here.

Also, you can find videos with small airplanes flying through the cave.

You can even meet information about the flight of jet fighters, but there is no photo or video evidence on the Internet.

Above the cave, there is an entrance to the escalator in the rock, which will take you down to another escalator, then to the third one and so on. They will take you down to the foot of the cave.

Then you can either go down by 999 steps of "Stairway to Heaven", or continue descending by the escalators, they are on the left, inside the rock.


Downstairs, the shuttle will take you to the center of Zhangjiajie.

In 2017 here was built the world's longest track for parkour. Video:

And in 2018, Range Rover drove up the stairs.

Getting there: It's surprisingly easy to get here. The lower cable car station is located in Zhangjiajie (张家界市). It has its own airport Zhangjiajie Hehua Airport or Dayong (DYG), located just 5 kilometers from the lower station. Taxi drivers at the airport want $20 for these 5 kilometers, although the real price is $5. If your hotel speaks English, you can ask them to call you a taxi to the airport. You can also come by train, travel time from Shanghai is about 20 hours.