(1) The road to Refuge Rock, where Huineng, the Sixth Patriarch of Chan, hid from an angry mob that actually set the mountainside on fire.
The red line shows my outward path. Taking a wrong turn, I ended up at a farmhouse, where the family pointed me up the hill. It was very slow going (see next), but despite rain, slippery rocks, and a trail so overgrown I couldn't see my feet, I made it.
(2) A closer view. In fact, the trail (which is fairly clear in this photo, following the wide brown swatch) is now incredibly overgrown. Either that, or I didn't take the visible one, but rather an invisible one in the brush. Hard to say.
(3) The bridge across "Cao's Creek," where I started my 6km+ round trip.
(4) Cao's (famous) Creek
(5) Lots of farm houses along the way.
(6) A shrine was set up in a hollow tree.
(7) Entrance to the compound (but where I exited, having entered from the back way).
(8) The Refuge Rock. I was touched when the girl from the farmhouse (and her dog) came through that gateway calling :"Uncle! Are you okay?"
(9) This is allegedly where Huineng hid, and the red on the back is supposedly the mark of his robe. (How convenient that this hole was here, and there's a matching story in the Platform Sutra, eh?)
(10) This is pretty much the whole compound.
(11) The little altar. Bill Porter says there was a nun/caretaker a few years before. There is no longer a place for one; the small wooden building just outside the compound has burned.
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Last Updated August 18, 2019
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