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An old Chinese saying goes: To climb a mountain is hard, but to climb Mount Tai is harder. We prove it personally after using more than five hours to climb the Mount Tai, which is the longest mountain-scaling journey in my life.

Mount Tai is located at the south of Luan city in eastern China's Shandong province. In 1987, Mountain Tai was listed as both a world natural and cultural heritage by UNESCO. It was the first place named as double heritage to the world. It is also one of the 50 World Geoparks in the world.

We decide to climb Mount Tai at 10 p.m. and try to reach the main peak: Jade Emperor Summit (which is 1545 meters above the sea) timely to see the sunrise.

We choose the East Route. Starting to climb from the Dai Temple at the foot of the Mountain, we pass Hushan, Hong men sub geopark and Luo Han Precipice, on our way, we see a lot of carved stones and the streams cheerfully flowing. After walking numerous stone steps, we reach the Mid-heaven Gate.

Going ahead, we come to Bu Yun Bridge, from where the mountain is gradually getting steep. The steps just seem like a ladder from the heaven hung between two peaks, which are full of twists and turns called Eighteen Bends. There are a lot of megaliths on both sides of the Eighteen Bends, with plenty of exotic flowers, rare herbs, pines, cypresses and willows between them. Though in the darkness, we just can lean on the weak light of the torch to enjoy the scenery , we still feel that there are too many beautiful things to be fully appreciated.

Actually, when we think we have finished climbing the Eighteen Bends, we just climb a quarter of them. As climbing higher and higher, the Eighteen Bends become more and more precipitous. Almost all the steps are full of breathless people sitting for a rest. The Eighteen Bends is really the assaying stone which examines people’s physical strength and will. With the rise of the altitude, the temperature is getting lower and it is misty around, which makes we feel we are in the fairyland.

We eventually see the Southerly Heaven Gate in about 100 meters ahead, but we feel we have walked thousands meters to get there. Though this section of the steps is really steep to climb, we are all inspired by the happiness of the coming success in scaling the Mount Tai.

After passing the Southerly Heaven Gate, we reach the Heaven Street. The broad and flat street seems stretching into the clouds in the sky, with pavilions rising against the mountain on the left and the abyss filled with clouds on the right. It is 4 a.m. at the moment, the mountain wind howling roughly and the chill carving our bones. Turning our heads back, we see the lamplights glittering in the darkness, and the moon is too closed to us as if we can pull it into our arms. Isn’t it the Heaven Street?

We find a restaurant in the Heaven Street having a bowl of hot noodles to escape the cold. As we are too tired, we fall asleep bending over the table for an hour until the proprietress wakes us up at 5 a.m. We quickly make a fresh start to climb the peak of Mount Tai: the Jade Emperor Summit to see the sunrise. The route is very narrow stretching till the apex of the Jade Emperor Summit, and it is even more precipitous than the route to the Southerly Heaven Gate.

When reaching the apex, we find crowds thronged there, waiting happily excitedly. Standing on the crest, viewing all the mountains below in the sea of clouds, we appreciate personally a well-known saying of Confucius: Scaling the Mount Tai makes one feel superior to the whole world. Looking into the distance, the color of the eastern sky gradually changes from the dark blue into light blue, silver grey, hoar, bright white, and then orange, saffron, flaming……The color of the sky is still changing with an especially red cloud there. Guessing the sun will come out from it, we all fix eyes on it. Some visitors cry at intervals, making us to be worried to miss the very moment of sunrise.

A light red line on the horizon is expanding slowly. In the middle of it, the line protrudes as a sector, as if myriad light will shine from there. Someone cries: “The sun is coming out!” At that moment, the top of the sun seems like a small tongue quietly stretches from the horizon. We quickly take photos to memorize this astonish moment. The small tongue gradually becomes a semicircle, and then the sun leap out of the horizon completely, gloriously radiant. We are so cheerful and excited to forget the tiredness and cold last night. It is really a worthy trip.

When going down, we take a cable car from the Southerly Heaven Gate, and reach the Mid-heaven Gate 15 minutes later. And then we take the sightseeing bus reaching the foot of the Mount Tai after about an hour. Turning our heads back, seeing the majestic Mount Tai which rises from the flat, we even can’t believe that we have scaled it step by step.