12 kilometers south of the city of Luoyang, the Longmen Grottoes stretch for about 1 km along the west bank of the Yihe River. Magnificent Buddhist statues have been carved into the limestone. The setting is sublime at Mount Xiang Shang on one side, Mount Longmen Shan on the other, and the Yihe River in the middle. The construction began at the end of the 5th century and lasted for more than four centuries.

Longmen is about 2100 caves housing more than 100,000 engravings and sculptures of the Buddha, hundreds of representations of pagodas, and almost 4,000 inscriptions on monuments. The tallest measures 17 m in height and the smallest only 2 cm! The Fengxianxi Cave is probably the one that offers the most accomplished work. The fine detail is simply astounding. With their unique artistic and cultural richness, the Longmen Grottoes were listed as World Heritage in 2000.

As one of the top tourist attractions in China, the Longmen Grottoes is full of tourists, especially during the annual Luoyang Peony Festival (early April to early May), the National Day (1st -7th October), The Chinese New Year (between the late January and the middle February), and summer break (July to August).