Mount Hua Climbing Guide: North Up, West Down, Low Intensity Version

Tickets for Mount Hua, shuttle buses, and cable cars all need to be booked online in advance. 1. Take the high-speed train 🚄 to Mount Hua ⛰️. 8:25 Xi'an North - Mount Hua North 8:55. After exiting Mount Hua North Station, walk straight to the roadside (do not cross the road), then turn left. You will see a shuttle bus 🚍 directly to Mount Hua. Buy a ticket (5 yuan/person) and take the shuttle bus 🚍 directly to the Mount Hua Visitor Center. The journey takes about 15-20 minutes. 2. At the Mount Hua Visitor Center, there are two signs, North Up and West Up. I entered from the North Up, scanned my ID card to queue for the cable car 🚡. The queue for the cable car took 1.5 hours, and the cable car 🚡 ride took 6 minutes. 3. The time to reach the North Peak by cable car was around 11:30. We wandered around the North Peak for a while, went to the restroom, and enjoyed the scenery. We set off from the North Peak to the Central Peak and East Peak at around 12:00. 4. North Peak - Central Peak - East Peak: This route took about 2.5 hours to climb, including sightseeing time, rest time, and queuing time due to the crowded path. This part of the journey was quite interesting. 5. After climbing the East Peak, we queued for the Sparrow Hawk Turn. We reached the queue spot at 14:30. Including queuing and playing, we left the Sparrow Hawk Turn for the South Peak at 17:30. This activity is time-consuming, so if you want to play, you need to allocate time in advance. We originally wanted to queue for the Plank Walk in the Sky, but due to time constraints, we didn't go. The queuing time for the Plank Walk in the Sky is about 4 hours. 6. Sparrow Hawk Turn - South Peak: After playing the Sparrow Hawk Turn, we continued to climb the South Peak. This part of the journey was very tiring. Since the Sparrow Hawk Turn also consumed a lot of energy, it took me about 40 minutes to reach the South Peak, arriving at around 18:20. After playing and checking in at the South Peak, we headed to the West Peak. 7. South Peak - West Peak: There is a shortcut from the South Peak to the West Peak. Do not follow the signposted uphill direction; go in the opposite downhill direction. It takes about 20 minutes to reach the West Peak. After a quick tour of the West Peak, we queued for the West Peak cable car. 8. West Peak cable car down the mountain: We started queuing at 19:00 and got on the cable car 🚡 at 19:55. The cable car 🚡 ride down took about 15 minutes. 9. After getting off the West Peak cable car 🚡, you are not yet at the bottom of the mountain. You need to take a slide (30 yuan/person) or walk down more than 300 steps. We were too tired, so we took the slide, which took 2 minutes. By the time we reached the halfway point, it was already 20:25. 10. From this halfway point to the bottom of the mountain's visitor center, you need to take another shuttle bus 🚍 (60 yuan/person). You can't get down the mountain without taking the bus. The bus ride takes about 40 minutes. We got on the bus at 20:35 and arrived at the Mount Hua Visitor Center at around 21:10. 11. Mount Hua Visitor Center - Xi'an: Finally, when we were heading back to Xi'an, we were too exhausted to bother with anything else, so we took a shuttle bus (60 yuan/person). There are quite a few stops, and it's relatively convenient. However, you have to wait for the bus to fill up before it departs. We got on the bus at around 21:40, and it departed at 22:10. The bus ride took 1 hour and 10 minutes, and we finally arrived at the hotel at 23:30. Climbing the mountain wasn't too tiring, but the queuing was really exhausting 😓