The trails are rather simple, expecially if you are used to the Alps, but the atmosphere of the place is incredibly charming thanks to the blend of Buddhist religion and martial arts.
Mt. Songshan got its fame from being the place where the Indian monk Batuo founded the Shaolin temple in 495 a.C. Few years later in 527 a.D. another Indian monk, Damo (or Bodhidharma) moved to the temple to teach the Chan sect of Buddhism, best known as Zen Buddhism (Zen is the way Japaneses read the Chinese ideogram for Chan). Buddhism was been already introduced in China during the first century b.C., but the many cultural differencies between India and China made the strict Hinayana form to be not well accepted. The Chan version was instead more adapt to the Chinese culture and became rapidly the most influential Buddhist school in China.
A huge statue of Damo is located at the summit of Mount Songshan and is visible from the valley.
Ascending to the summit of Mt. Songshan is rather simple and takes about 45 - 60 minutes. Though there are many variants to the top, here is described the simplest and most popular, as it reachs also the cave where Bodhidharma meditated for nine years.
The main trail to the summit starts between the Shaolin temple and the Forest of Stupas. The Forest is in fact a cemetery where about 230 pagodas (stupa) were built since 791 a.C. They contain the ashes of the abbots and the higher rank monks.
At the left side of the temple, just after the square where the buses turn, is an unpaved clearing with a narrow stone-paved road leaving from the bottom. The road turns immediately to the left, running across a couple of small farms. Always follow this road and ignore the small trails leaving from its right side.
The trail continues with a few soft turns between soya and maize fields, then a sequence of steep and narrow staircases run rapidly to the cave of Bodhidharma.
On this trail during the early morning or the late afternoon is common to meet several martial art students or monks running up and down. The woods out of the trails is the place where the gongfu training is accomplished by the Shaolin monks and the several masters living in the valley.
The Bodhidharma cave is where according to the legend the monk meditated for nine years, facing the wall and unaware of the birds building their nests on his shoulders.
Nowadays the cave is visited by several Buddhists which stop here to pray and burn incense.
Inside the cave are the statues of Bodhidharma and his disciples Huike, Sengcan and Daoxin. The stone arch outside the cave was built in 1604 a.C.
From the cave in a few steps the summit is reached.
The trail to the right brings back to the valley, the one to the left goes just beneath the Bodhidharma statue. A sort of small temple here allows the visitors to burn incense.
Another few meters and the trail ends in a small and cute pagoda.
