Lingquan Temple Grottoes, also known as Wanfogou, Xiaolongmen

Lingquan Temple Grottoes 📍Address: Nanping Village, Shanying Town, Anyang County, Anyang City 🎫Ticket price: CNY 30 🕙Opening hours: 8:00–18:00 🅿Parking lot: Paid ✨Introduction: First carved during the Eastern Wei Dynasty and continuously carved and renovated through the Northern Qi, Northern Zhou, Sui, and Tang dynasties, the grottoes contain a large number of Buddha statues, Bodhisattva statues, and disciple statues, each with unique shapes and lifelike expressions. The entire Lingquan Chan Temple (temple complex) was built in the 21st century and is still undergoing renovations. The only evidence of the temple's history are the two ancient pagodas standing within the temple grounds. The stone carvings on the pagodas shimmer in the sunlight with a millennium-old splendor. Site Features Carved into the mountainside, the Lingquan Temple Grottoes are arranged in three levels: upper, middle, and lower. The niches on each level are not on the same horizontal line, and their height is generally around one meter. They were mainly carved during the Sui and Tang dynasties. The carved pagoda forest on the cliff face of Lingquan Temple is an innovative approach that saves time, effort, cost, and space. While cliff-side niches and pagodas are common in many grottoes, they are usually scattered, fewer in number, and from later periods. The niches here have unique shapes and come in a wide variety.