LORE ROUTES

Every landmark has a story.
We help you hear it.

History, legends and poetry behind the world's places — told the way a knowledgeable friend would tell them. Starting with China.

Explore destinations Get the LoreLens app

Destinations

Stories from the Yangtze corridor

Our first collection follows the great river through Chongqing — gorges, ghost cities, and a train that runs through a building.

Qutang Gorge: The Landscape on the 10-Yuan Note

Chongqing · Yangtze River

Qutang Gorge: The Landscape on the 10-Yuan Note

The shortest of the Three Gorges is also the most dramatic — a river squeezed to a hundred meters between kilometer-high cliffs, guarded by a fortress where an emperor died of heartbreak.

5 min read

 Fengdu Ghost City: Visit the Afterlife, Come Back Alive

Chongqing · Yangtze River

Fengdu Ghost City: Visit the Afterlife, Come Back Alive

For two thousand years, Chinese imagination has located the capital of the dead on this one mountain — complete with courts, passports, and paperwork. It all began with a pun.

4 min read

 Liziba: The Train That Runs Through an Apartment Building

Chongqing · City

Liziba: The Train That Runs Through an Apartment Building

Every few minutes in Chongqing, a full-sized metro train flies straight through the middle of a 19-story residential tower. It was designed that way — and the reason is the city itself.

4 min read

 The Hanging Coffins of the Yangtze

Chongqing · Yangtze River

The Hanging Coffins of the Yangtze

A hundred meters above the river, wedged into cliff crevices, wooden coffins have hung for over two thousand years. Who put them there — and how — is one of China's great mysteries.

5 min read
◈

Shandong · Sacred Mountains

Mount Tai: The Mountain Emperors Climbed to Talk to Heaven

For over two thousand years, when a Chinese emperor wanted to prove his right to rule, he climbed this mountain. Confucius climbed it. Poets climbed it. Tonight, thousands will climb it in the dark — to catch the sunrise.

6 min read
◈

Beijing · Great Wall

Juyongguan: The Great Wall's Front Door to Beijing

Every army that ever wanted Beijing had to solve the same problem: a narrow mountain valley sealed by one fortress. Genghis Khan solved it. Most didn't. This is the pass the capital lived and died by.

6 min read
◈

Hubei · Yangtze River

Three Gorges Dam: The Wall That Tamed the Yangtze

The world's largest power station began as one line in a poem and one sentence in a 1919 plan. A century, 1.3 million relocated people and 28 million cubic meters of concrete later — here it is.

6 min read
LoreLens app icon

LORELENS · AI TOUR GUIDE

Point your camera at a landmark.
Hear its story.

LoreLens identifies landmarks from a photo and narrates the history, legends and poetry behind them — in English or Chinese, right in your ear. Free on iOS.

Download on the App Store Learn more

Travel Tips

Know before you go

A First-Timer's Guide to the Yangtze River Cruise

Which direction to sail, how many nights you need, what the shore excursions actually are, and the one deck rule that gets you the best photos — everything worth knowing before you board.

6 min read · Updated 2026-07-23