In 1883, France, which had colonized Vietnam for 20 years, launched the Sino-French War, and according to the Sino-French New Covenant signed two years later, the French obtained the right to build and manage the Yunnan-Yue Railway. The railway starts in Kunming and ends in Haiphong, Vietnam, with a total length of 859 kilometers. The Yunnan section from Kunming to Hekou (also known as the Kunhe Railway) is 468 kilometers long and was opened to traffic in 1910.
An important purpose of the French in building the Yunnan-Yue Railway was to mine and transport old tin mines, but as the first railway in southwest China, the Yunnan-Yue Line objectively promoted the development of Yunnan's industry and social progress. Many historical events are related to the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway, such as Cai Wei's return to Kunming along this railway to launch the Yuan Campaign, and two of the three routes to Yunnan from Vietnam to Yunnan via the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway during the Anti-Japanese War.
In 1946, China took back the ownership and operation of the Yunnan section of the Yunnan-Yue Railway, and in 2013, the Yumeng Railway was opened and connected to the Kunyu Railway, and the Kunhe Railway was gradually suspended. From Kunming to Hekou, there were about 40 stations along the Yunnan-Yue Railway, passing through Kunming urban area and Yiliang, Huaning, Maitreya, Kaiyuan, Mengzi, Pingbian and Hekou counties and cities in Honghe Prefecture. So what are the ruins of the Yunnan-Yue Railway along the way, and what other scenic spots are worth visiting around?
Kunming, where the Yunnan-Yue Railway begins, is the capital of Yunnan Province, which is the base camp and transit station for Yunnan tourism, and the Yunnan Railway Museum at Kunming North Railway Station has a detailed introduction to the Yunnan-Yue Railway. If you have time, you can feed the red-billed gulls by the Green Lake, or spend half a day at Dounan Flower Market to see the flowers. However, winter is when the buckwheat is ripe, so don't miss the harvest season in the red soil of Dongchuan. A little later, the red rice terraces dotted with residual snow here are compared to the Yuanyang rice terraces.
Yiliang's Jiuxiang has hundreds of large and small caves, known as the "cave museum", and after going deep underground, you can either follow the trail or take a boat to play in the canyon. Compared with those caves featuring stalagmites, the Jiuxiang Cave is mainly a scene tour that changes scenery, Kanda, Lion Hall, Ancient River Piercing, and Soul Gap, under the illumination of colorful lights, it looks magical and fun. Jiuxiang is very close to the Lunan Stone Forest, and you can combine the two scenic spots in a day trip from Kunming downtown.
Maitreya is the first stop of the Yunnan-Yue Railway into Honghe Prefecture, which is half an hour by high-speed train from Kunming. Located in the subtropics, the northern gate of this Red River State has a clean and fresh appearance with flowers in all seasons. In the Jinping Mountain Scenic Area, the nearly 20-meter-high Maitreya Buddha is the world's largest seated statue of Maitreya; The kaleidoscopic style town built in recent years is a successful example of a characteristic cultural tourism complex, among which the Oriental Yun Art Museum, known as the ugly cute, is a mecca for Internet celebrities to take photos.
Since Mengxi is the capital of Honghe Prefecture, the small city has been rarely visited by tourists since the Yuanyang Rice Terraces and Jianshui Ancient City became popular tourist destinations in Honghe Prefecture. But the release of the movie "Fanghua" made the small station Bisezhai in its territory famous. However, compared with the Yunnan-Yue Railway, Bisezhai is mentioned more often when introducing another railway line in Yunnan, the Bishi Railway, which was built in the early 20th century. The long-abandoned Bisezhai has been transformed into a free attraction for tourists to visit.
The most noteworthy buildings in Mengzi City are the four French-style buildings: the Colos, the French Consulate, the French Prison, and the French Garden Winery and the Customs and Taxation Department, which were once the General Administration of the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway, of which the Goros Foreign Company has been opened into the Memorial Hall of the Southwest United University Mengzi Branch. After visiting these buildings, don't miss the South Lake in front of you, a 320,000-square-meter lake with twists and turns of arch bridges and corridors, with occasional pavilions for visitors to take a break.
If there is any unmissable site on the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway, it is the non-herringbone bridge. The Yunnan-Vietnam Railway was called by the British Times at the time as the "world's three engineering wonders" alongside the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal, and the herringbone bridge was a miracle of this miracle. The most crucial bridge on the Yunnan-Yue Railway is in the valley between Pingbian Heping Town and Wantang Township, and the train passes through the bridge deck through the cliff tunnels on both sides, like a tightrope walking.
by French female engineer Bauer. Bodin's brilliantly conceived and ingenious bridge is only 67 meters long, but the deck is 102 meters from the valley floor, so named because the two diagonal braces under the bridge resemble the character "human". The entire bridge does not have a single pier, but it is still intact a hundred years later. The road to the Renzi Bridge is remote and difficult, starting from Mengzi, passing through Heping Town in Pingbian County to reach the Bridge, and then passing through Wantang Township and Baizhai to reach the estuary, which is a self-driving route accompanied by mountains and rivers along the way.
Hekou County is located at the confluence of the Red River and the Nanxi River, where the Yunnan-Yue Railway is bounded, with the Yunnan section to the north and the Yue section to the south. There is no train connection from Kunming to Vietnam via the estuary, but tourists will mostly take a turn near the China-Vietnam Railway Bridge where freight trains take and take photos with the two countries in the same shot. The nearby French Customs House has been converted into a memorial to the estuary uprising of the Confederate Society, and you can spend a quarter of an hour inside to learn about this history.
There are eight trains a day from Kunming to Hekou, six of which are intercity bullet trains, which take only about four hours, passing through Jianshui, Mengzi and Pingbian on the way. From the construction of the underwater car, you can use this as the central loop to visit the terraced fields of Yuanyang, Honghe and Lvchun, as well as the two ancient cities of Jianshui and Shiping. The Red River State is not cold in winter, and the terraces are just in season for the water. If you have a week, you might as well take a warm winter trip to the Red River along the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway.
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