Goddess Peak, in Three Gorges, Yangtze River

Goddess Peak (神女峰) is located in the north of Yangtze River, 15 kilometers from east of Wushan County (巫山县). Goddess Peak is actually a giant stone, standing in clouds and fog, so seen from water it seems like a fairy goddess. It has the typical features of ancient beauties in China, hence many poets or essayers wrote a lot of articles to speak highly of her charm and prettiness.

As for the anecdotes or fairy story of Goddess Peak, there are diversified. One is the story, created by Song Yu in his famous article – Ode to Goddess, the pretty goddess had a date with Chuxiangwang (the emperor of ancient Chu State), the other one is that Goddess Yao Ji (瑶姬) intentionally got down from the heaven to the earthly world in order to help Da Yu (大禹) with flood control.

Yao Ji was a fairy princess living in the heaven, but she was very tired of heavenly life, so she traveled the earthly world with her sisters. During their trip, they found 12 evil dragons doing harm by casting devilish spells to the earthly people. So she helped Da Yu to fight the flood, besides, she also managed to present Da Yu a book written about flood control, but she was caught by the sacred soldiers from the heaven before she told how to use this book. Later, she returned to the earthly world with the deadline set by queen. She helped Da Yu succeeded in dredging the rivers between the mountains and gorges. She also fell in love with the three gorges and forgot the deadline. Therefore, she stayed in the earthly world to lead the boats in trouble and did good things to the local, as time went she became a peak forever. Nowadays, travelers visiting Yangtze River’s Three Gorges can always see her prettiness on the peak.

The magnificent scene of Goddess Peak, looking from afar