Mount Emei Monastery Stay: Baoguo Temple & Golden Summit

Why stay

Emei is one of the four sacred Buddhist mountains, and it is large. Between nine and five it is also very busy. The hours that are not busy are the ones the day-trippers are not there for: dusk, and the hour after six in the morning. So the design of these two days is simple. You stay for those hours.

What staying past five actually gets you

A monastery on Mt Emei shuts its gates to the public at 5 pm. You stay inside — vegetarian dinner, an evening with a senior monk, chanting at six, and a kungfu class at seven, before the Golden Summit.

You'll see

A working monastery with the public gone — the courtyards empty from six
Monks at morning chanting, 6 to 7 am, from inside the hall rather than a doorway
Wild macaques on the trail, close and unbothered
The Golden Summit at over 3,000 metres — cloud sea if the weather gives it to you

You'll eat

Vegetarian dinner cooked inside the monastery, at the monks' own table
Breakfast the next morning, same room
Lunch in the villagers' restaurants at the foot of the walk — bamboo shoot, local sausage, cured pork

You'll hear

A senior monk, introduced by your guide, on his own practice — for as long as the conversation runs
Chanting at six, which is the thing guests write to us about afterwards
A kungfu master correcting you, out loud, at seven in the morning

You'll take home

A kungfu form you were actually taught, not shown
A night's sleep inside a Buddhist monastery — simple and clean, and we mean both words
The specific quiet of a mountain temple after the last bus has gone

How it unfolds

Day 1 · 10:30 · Two hours downhill
The green bus takes you to the Wannian Temple parking area — the Temple of Ten Thousand Years — and you go up by foot or cable car, your choice. From there it is roughly two hours walking down to Baoguo, past temples, a river, pavilions and a lake. Downhill is deliberate: it is the direction on this mountain that leaves you able to enjoy the evening.
Day 1 · 12:30 · Bamboo shoot, sausage, bacon
You eat in the villagers' restaurants at the foot of the walk — local bamboo shoot, local sausage, local cured pork. Lunch is excluded from the price so you order what you want rather than what a group menu decided. Also: the monkeys are real, they are bold, and they will take an unattended bag.
Day 1 · 18:00 · Vegetarian dinner, and no crowd
At six your twelve hours begin. Dinner is vegetarian and eaten inside. What is unusual is not the food — it is that the building has emptied. The monastery has been closed to the public for an hour, and the courtyards you walked through in the afternoon now have nobody in them.
Day 1 · 19:10 · One monk, as long as it runs
Your guide introduces one of the senior monks, who talks about his own practice and answers what you ask. It is not a lecture and there is no set length. Afterwards you have the temple and the grounds to yourself until morning, which is the part people describe afterwards rather than the talk itself.
Day 2 · 06:00 · You can get up for it, or not
The monks begin chanting around six and go on for about an hour. Getting up for it is optional and strongly recommended — it is the reason to be inside the building rather than in a hotel down the road. On the accommodation: it is simple and clean, and we would rather say that plainly than dress it up.
Day 2 · 07:00 · A class, with a real master
Emei is one of China's named martial arts traditions, alongside Shaolin and Wudang. The class happens outside the temple, first thing, with a master who teaches properly — meaning you will be corrected, repeatedly, in front of the others. Nobody minds. Everyone is equally bad at seven in the morning.
Day 2 · 11:00 · Bus, walk, cable car, arrive
An hour and a half of bus to the Leidongping parking area at 2,430 metres, half an hour on foot, then the cable car to the summit. Monkeys again on the way, and bolder up here. What you get at the top depends entirely on the weather, and we will not pretend otherwise — on a clear day it is the sea of cloud everyone comes for.

The summit is the postcard. The night is the reason.

Most itineraries run this the other way round

Almost every Emei itinerary puts the summit first and treats the monasteries as things you pass on the way up. That produces one very long day and a photograph.

This one inverts it. Day one is a downhill walk and an evening that only exists because the gates shut at five. Day two you are already on the mountain and rested, so the summit is a morning rather than an ordeal.

The two things guests write to us about afterwards are the chanting and the kungfu class. Both happen before eight in the morning, and neither is possible if you slept in a hotel in town.