When friends in Singapore hear I’m from Chongqing, their minds usually go to hotpot and cable cars and the Yangtze River glowing in the distance. I’ve spent hours explaining to them that Chongqing is so much more than urban entertainment.
In my mind, the real Chongqing has always been up in the mountains. As a kid I used to play on stone pathways snaking through the forest, visit secluded mountain temples, and climb up and down the neighbourhoods carved out of the hillsides. Then 12 years ago, I left Chongqing to study in Singapore. I ended up staying to work and build a life there.
Distance makes the heart grow fonder, they say. Or at least, it makes you view home in a new way.
Homecoming in Chongqing
Every time I return to Chongqing these days, I feel an urge to escape the high-speed expressways and city skyscrapers that have multiplied during my years abroad, and return to the quieter places. The places that felt like home to me as a child. Not the crowded bustling streets, but the simpler mountain paths where the air is cooler and the wind louder and the trees smell like earth.
On my last trip to Chongqing this autumn, I took a full day to explore one of my favourite quietest and most nostalgic hiking routes in the area:
Huangge Ancient Path → Laojun Cave → Tushan Temple → Tushan Ancient Path → Qingshuixi Trail
This ended up being a lovely combination of nature, mountain temples, warm tea, and old neighbourhood streets. But above all, it made me fall in love with the Chongqing I remembered.
1. Huangge Ancient Path: Back in the Forests of My Childhood
I started my hike at Huangge Ancient Path. Huangge is a covered stone pathway meandering through dense forest. As soon as I stepped on the uneven stones I instantly felt grounded. The air smelled just how I remember it in Chongqing’s mountains, cool and earthy, especially in autumn.
As a child, my parents would often take me on forest pathways like these. I remember being a rather whiny kid who complained about the steep stone steps leading up and down. But now living in Singapore for so many years, most of the urban areas are flat and not hilly at all. Climbing steps and walking uphill make me feel strangely comforted by these days. I could almost say I miss them.
The sunlight filtered down through the thick branches and leaves above, dappling the ground in soft patches. As I walked, the shapes on the ground shifted with my steps. On every turn I was surprised to find even more green and calm and more of this mountain city I grew up in.
2. Laojun Cave: Rediscovering an Old Temple with New Eyes
As the trail meandered and ascended, eventually the forest opened up to the bright red stone walls of Laojun Cave, a Taoist temple that sits halfway up the hillside. I’ve known this temple my entire life, but never paid it much attention as a child. Now walking up its sweeping staircase I saw it with fresh eyes.
The architecture is beautiful, from the sweeping curved eaves to the stone guardians and weathered wooden beams and carvings that have softened with age. At the top of the staircase, the forest slopes out behind you.
Inside the temple, time slowed down. People spoke in hushed tones, the incense smoke wafted upwards, and a cool breeze from the mountains touched the red walls.
Here, I suddenly realised just how much living away from home for so long has changed me. Everything that I had taken for granted and considered “normal” had now become precious.
3. A Nostalgic Old Street that Feels Like Memory Lane
Exiting the temple and Laojun Cave, I wandered down into a small neighbourhood street brimming with nostalgia. Wooden houses and red lanterns, small brick storefronts and narrow stone pathways. It immediately felt like a stroll through my childhood.
An old lady sat on the side of the road peeling chestnuts. A toddler ran past carrying snacks. A university student sat underneath an old tree sketching a storefront.
Chongqing isn’t just city towers and shopping malls and busy traffic, it’s also this. It’s warm, it’s grounding, it’s rich with the simple rhythms of daily life.
4. Tushan Temple: A Tea Break that Warmed My Heart
The path continued a gentle downhill and to Tushan Temple. This was by far my favourite section of the entire hike. The temple itself sits nestled in the shade of the tall trees. Yellow stone walls, roots and branches covered in moss, and rooftops of green-tiled tiles that feel like a haiku poem in the soft autumn light. In the open-air pavilion in the centre of the temple there are wooden tables and bamboo curtains fluttering in the wind. And complete peace.
I ordered a hot tea and took a book from my bag.
The mountain wind was cool.
The temple bells rang faintly from time to time.
It felt like the entire world had paused, just for a while.
I sat at Tushan Temple and my eyes filled with tears.
It’s been 12 years since I’ve last lived in Chongqing and I never expected that just sitting here would move me this way. It was the kind of peace that I didn’t realise I had been missing for so long.
5. Descending through Tushan Ancient Path & Qingshuixi Trail
Refreshed from my tea break, I continued downhill on Tushan Ancient Path, a gentle descent beside tall trees with patches of sunlight filtering down through the branches. After a while, this merged with Qingshuixi Trail, a beautiful stretch of walkway beside a small creek. The air was a bit cooler and the water clear and running.
The kind of forest walk that soothes you from head to toe. No hurry. No noise. Just the steady rhythm of walking and mountain air.
This was the perfect ending to my day’s hike.
The Mountain Chongqing I Remember
Living abroad has a way of changing your view of home. As someone who has left their hometown and spent the past 12 years living elsewhere, I thought it was interesting how my homecomings to Chongqing have evolved in this time.
Chongqing is growing so fast these days. The new expressways and shopping malls and high-rise office towers are everywhere. The city is changing and evolving. But the mountains stay. The mountains, the temples, the old winding paths through the forest, they remain here quietly unchanged.
I feel like every time I come back to Chongqing, I’m coming back to myself, in a way. Hiking this route made me rediscover pieces of my childhood, and despite how much Chongqing has changed over the years, these ancient paths have remained. For anyone visiting Chongqing for the first time, I think this route offers a nice combination of nature and old city life, and a window into a gentler, more soulful side of the city.
And for anyone like me, who used to call Chongqing home a long time ago and just hasn’t felt at home anywhere else quite as much since – I hope this walk stirs up memories in you too.
Chongqing Hike: Huangge Ancient Path → Laojun Cave → Tushan Temple → Qingshuixi Trail