Rizhao's eighth stop - the world's first ginkgo tree.

What I was most looking forward to in Rizhao was to come to Dinglin Temple to see with my own eyes this ginkgo tree, which is about 4,000 years old and is the largest ginkgo tree on earth today - commonly known as the "Ginkgo King", which entered the Guinness World Records in 1990.

As soon as I entered the gate of Fulaishan, I went straight to it, and I could see it at the bottom of the steps of Dinglin Temple. (Figure 1)

The location of the "Ginkgo King" is very special, Fulaishan is composed of three peaks of Feilai, Fulaishan and Fulaishan, and it grows at the bottom of the mountain where the three peaks are gathered, next to Qingquan Gorge and Wolong Spring, which never dries up.

After carefully appreciating it, I went further to learn about Dinglin Temple.
Dinglin Temple is located under Fulaifeng, it was built in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and has a history of more than 1,500 years. According to historical records, the temple was built in Jin, and the ancestor monks were Zhu Fatai and Seng Yuan.
The whole temple building is divided into three courtyards in the front, middle and back. The door of the mountain gate is hung with a huge plaque of "Dinglin Temple", and the stone stele on the left side of the door is engraved with "Liu Xie's former residence". Liu Xie (c. 465-521, author of "Wen Xin Diao Long") was a native of Dongguan Ju during the Southern and Northern Dynasties (that is, a native of Ju County, Rizhao City), who served as a county magistrate, infantry captain, and a servant in the palace, and was a famous literary theorist in ancient China. In his later years, he returned to his hometown and lived here, renaming the temple Dinglin Temple to express his nostalgia for Dinglin Temple in Nanjing.

Although the leaves were not yellow when we arrived, we were satisfied to see what it looked like.

Post by NomadicNavigatorNetwork | Nov 15, 2024