Jianshui

Ancient Architecture of Jianshui
Jianshui is a small town in Honghe prefecture,  in the southern part of Yunnan.  It is on the road Kunimg to the famous Yuanyang rice terraces, most of the travellers stay one night here to enjoy the atmophere of an ancient Chinese town.

There are numerous buildings of historic value and places of interest in this area, including over 100 temples ,academies of classical learning and large residences .

There are still kept in good condition, including the Chaoyang Gateway Arch, the Jianshui Confucius Temple, the Zhilin Temple, Shuanglong Bridge, the Private Garden of the Zhu Family and the Ancient Nalou office Building.

In addition ,within the territory of Jianshui ,there is beautiful natural scenery like Swallow Cave. which is famous for its grand scene "thousands of swallows gathering in a cave", in 1994 the state Council approved that Jianshui should be listed among the third group of state scenic regions, and the ancient Jianshui City is one of the state historic and cultural cities.

The Private Garden of the Zhu Family lies in Jianshui Street ,Jianshui county, has a total area of 20,000 square meters and a floor space of 5,000 square meters , This grand complex is a typical local residence with distinctive features .As it was built by Zhu Chaoying and his brother in the late Qing Dynasty ,it got the name "the Private Garden of the Zhu Family ".

Divided into dwelling houses and ancestral halls ,the privat garden has layout of "vertically, three countyardhouses and horizontally ,four " and "four small yards attached to one big yard" .Altogether there are 42 yards . With the well arranged yarda and well furnished room and halls ,the structure of the architecture can be described as "streamlined " .On the left side and near the street are 13 suspending houses and the right side are the ancestral halls that face a pool ,a sate and pavilions .Poems and pictures are carved on the stone banisters around the pool .

In the center of the garden there is a flower hall the two sides of which are called "xiulou" ,a place where ladies lived . The place in front of the flower hall is naturally divided into two gardens .Rockeries and rice fields in the east garden and bamboo groves and flowers in the west garden reveal a typical style of a southern private garden . Thus is enjoys the fame "the Daguan Darden at a Border Town". Large and magnificent buildings like the private Garden of the Zhu family are now rarely seen in China.Today , it is one of the provincial cultural relics .

Built in 1389Ad, Chaoyang Gateway Arch stands in the center of Jianshui County . Its significance to Jianshui is the same as that of Tian' Anmen to Beijing ,thus it has enjoyed the reputation of "the Miniature Tiananmen . Actually ,the Chaoyang Gateway Arch is 28 years older than Tiananmen. It is the symbol of this ancient military town in the southeast border and an emblem of Jianshui ,a historic and cultural city.

Known as one of the biggest and most splendid cave in Asia , the swallow cave is located in the mountains 30 kilometers east of Jianshui, and consists of a dry cave, a water cave and a 30,000 square meters natural forest ,with a total area of 100,000 square meters .Every year between spring and summer ,thousands of swallows will fly here from Malaysia, building nests and giving birth to and raising young swallows .Thus it is named "The Swallow Cave".