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Jiuxiang village, 70 km from Kunming, 47 km from Yiliang.
Kunming Prefecture.
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Dimension: | L=600m |
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Yincuixia (Shady Green Gorge) is a 600 m long gorge with a river of deep green colour. The gorge is used for motorboat trips with tourists. The special thing with this gorge is the fact that it is a karst feature. It is a so called cave ruin or roofless cave.
Obviously a roofless cave is a sort of paradox, as the definition of a cave requires the existence of a roof. If it is roofless, it is not a cave. This term is used to describe the formation of a gorge, which formed underground as a cave. As the cave became bigger and the roof thinner, the roof started to collapse. The karst windows were subject to intense erosion and grew fast, the roof shrank until it became a series of natural bridges and at the end those collapsed too. The result is a gorge with former cave walls, often - like in this case - with stalactites and other speleothems.
This valley is called Lovers' valley by the native Yi people.