The small temple at the top of the long flight of stairs has two tunnels on each side. Both basically lead to statues of Buddha carved out of the mountain. The statues are lit up with a soft light that gives them a reddish hue. There were a lot of tourists here admiring the carvings. Actually, not all of them were tourists. Since this is a mountain dedicated to Buddha, there will be Buddhists who come and say their prayers to Buddha.
At the temple just outside the tunnel, one can buy joss sticks that serve as an offering. Their intentions are written on a ribbon and offered to Buddha. It would be obvious that a lot of Chinese are strong believers of the Buddhist faith, since there were a lot of joss sticks ribbons on them.
At the end of the tunnel a path leads to a forested area. At this point my friend has moved on and I didn’t know where he went to. There weren’t and signs and there were too many forks in the road. Each on as likely as the next. I followed three different paths before finally locating him. Already very tired from searching for him, I paused to catch my breath.
My friend had found the main gate to the Giant Buddha and was at the top of the Leshan itself. There was a small park at the top where a nice little pavillion for resting was built. There was also a small artificial waterfall to the right. A statue of the man who commissioned the building of the Giant Buddha stands guard at the right.
I’m really excited to see the Giant Buddha, but I really need to rest my legs. All this walking is really making me feel old.
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