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Dear Travelers, We’d like to have the following quick guide to be always...
Dear Travelers,
We’d like to have the following quick guide to be always updated for the benefit of new visitors visiting Longji Rice Terraces from Guilin. If anybody having used the piece finds necessary updates, please leave a message or feedback. Thanks!
Plan your Guilin tour? Longji Rice Terrace (龙脊梯田), literally "Dragon's Backbone Terraced Paddy Fields", is a large scenic area. Officially known as Longji Rice Terrace Scenic Spot (龙脊梯田风景名胜区), it encompasses five natural villages - Dazhai Village (大寨) & Tiantouzhai Village (田头寨) (both Yao minority villages), Ping'An Zhuang Minority Village (平安寨), the Ancient Zhuang Minority Village (龙脊古壮寨）and Huangluohong Yao Minority Village (黄洛红瑶寨).
Longji Rice Terrace Scenic Spot mainly refers to the rice terraces in the three forest-fringed villages - Ping'An Village (平安寨), Dazhai Village (大寨) and Tiantouzhai Village ( 田头寨).
Ping'Ancun Village is 18km to the northeast of the Longji Rice Terrace Ticketing Office ( Also the Bus Station and Parking Lot for Longji).
Dazhaicun Village and Tiantouzhai Village are 24 km to the northeast of the Longji Ticketing Office Building. Tiantouzhai is located on the hillsides above Dazhai Village. Both the two villages are roughly in the same area.
Longji Rice Terrace Scenic Spot Ticket Office is located about 1km to the south of Hepingxian (和平乡), about 14 km to the southeast of Longsheng County (龙胜), 76km to the north of Guilin city proper (桂林) and 159km to the northwest of Yangshuo (阳朔).
The tourist service complex designed for Longji Rice Terrace Scenic Spot includes the ticketing office, bus station, toilets and other facilities.
There are daily buses directly getting to the Longji Ticketing Office Building from Guilin Qintan Bus Station and Guilin North Bus Station(76km)
If you take a car or van ( less than 9 seats ) to get to Longji Terrace, you can directly drive to each village. But you still need to purchase your ticket at the center before you go to each village.
At present, the official shuttle buses in Longji Rice Terrace Scenic Area are only designed for tourist groups instead of individual tourists. For those who come here organised by a travel agent need to purchase a 40-yuan bus ticket for the shuttle service shuttling from the ticketing office to Ping'An, Daizhai and Tiantouzhai.
It seems Longji Rice Terrace is not an individual tourist-friendly place where as an independent traveler, you are not allowed to use the shuttle service starting from the ticketing office. Instead, you have to take the local public buses outside the ticketing office to Ping'An (18km), or further to Dazhai and Tiantouzhai (24km).
It is an hourly bus ride with the bus fare at 40 yuan, a return ticket and valid for multi-days. So keep your bus ticket for a return trip from the villages back to the ticketing office.
All the local public buses come from Longsheng, on to Hepingxian Town and the ticketing office, so your bus ticket is also valid between the villages and Heping Town, or Longsheng. That means you are able to take bus to the villages directly from Heping Town or Longsheng as well as the Longji Ticketing Office.
For a day tripper from Guilin or Yangshuo, people don't have enough time to cover the three villages and have to make a choice between Ping'An Village, and Dazhai & Tiantouzhai villages due to the limited time since each village involves 2-3 hour hiking. Ping'An Village is about 19km away from Dazhai Village & Tiantouzhai Village.
So choose Ping'An Village, or its competitors Dazhai Village and Tiantouzhai Village? Ping'An Rice Terrace area often represents Longji Rice Terraces since Ping'Ancun Village was the first village in the scenic area developing rice terrace sightseeing tourism while Dazhai and Tiantouzhai are newcomers, beautiful competitors in a less touristy area.
Personally I highly recommend visiting Dazhai & Tiantouzhai since they have a much larger area put together of terraced paddy fields with more photogenic views. The upside is that they have a long cable car lifting you to the top of the mountain for a panoramic view of the terraced fields if you don't have strong legs for hiking.
There is the same parking area and entrance to the two villages with Tiantouzhai Village perched on the hillsides and Dazhai Village at the foot of the hills. There are three high viewing platforms in the area - Platform No. 1, No 2 and No. 3.
You may hike from Dazhaicun to No.02 Platform in Tiantouzhai and up to the No.01 Platform on the summit. The Platform No.03 can be reached by the cable car service starting from the parking lot and by the entrance. Cable car: 55 yuan single and 100 return tickets.
For a fast glimpse of the massive terrace rice fields, you may take the cable car up to the Viewing Platform No.03. For hiking lovers, you may hike up from Dazhai Village along the trails with English signposts.
The time hiking up to No.01 and No.2, then back to the entrance takes about 4-5 hours. The last return bus from Dazhai to the ticketing office or Longsheng leaves at 5:30 pm. So carefully schedule your travel time for a day trip to Longji.
Follow me to have a virtual tour of Dazhaicun Village and Tiantoucun Village.
The Parking Area by the entrance to Dazhaicun Village and the Cable Car Station.
Take the cable car up the Viewing Platform for a bird's-eye's view of the magnificent terraced paddy fields.
The Dazhai Village and the surrounding rice terraces viewed from the Platform No.03.
A close-up view of the rice terraces.
The bird's-eye view of the rice terraces from Panorama House Hotel higher on the mountain.
The Viewing platform No.01 is the best place in Longji to see the sunrise.
The sunrise over the terraced rice fields viewed from the Platform No.01.
The terraced paddy fields known as "Seven Star flying to the Moon".
The "the Thousand Terraces of the rice fields " viewed from the Platform No.02
Many individual trippers favor Ping'Ancun Village simply because it is closer to the ticketing office, saving time and another factor is Ping'An is more developed with better catering service and it is learned that even some foreigners run a bar restaurant there.
There are two Viewing Platforms - from the No.01 Platform you can catch the stunning view of the so-called "Nine Dragons and Five Tigers", a metaphor vividly depicting the terraced paddy fields resembling dragons and tigers; from the No.02 Platform you 'll see " Seven Stars Accompany the Moon" that refers the seven high terraced platform and the watered platform that resembles the Moon, a fantastic view.
The view of "Nine Dragons and Five Tigers " at Ping'An Village
The Seven Stars Accompanying the Moon at Ping'An
The Ping' An Village
Every year, the end of May and the beginning of June are the good season for viewing the terraces filled with water, when the terraces seem to be a layer of mirror.
The end of July and the beginning of August are all green. The end of September and the beginning of October are good time for viewing the golden yellow terraces.
If you don’t want to do a self-guided tour and prefer the hassle-free escorted tours, here are some options for organized tours to Guilin:
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