Discover Hangzhou
Leifeng Pagoda (Leifeng Pagoda in Evening Glow)
雷峰塔 / 雷峰夕照
A rebuilt five-storey pagoda on a hill at the lake's south-east corner, with lifts inside and the best elevated panorama of West Lake from its top gallery. The ruins of the original Song pagoda are preserved under glass at the base.
The story
What makes this place special
The first pagoda here was built in 975 by Qian Chu, the last Wuyue king, originally as an octagonal five-storey brick-and-timber tower. Centuries of neglect, people chipping bricks out of it for folk medicine and powder, and vibration from nearby building work brought it down on 25 September 1924 - a collapse Lu Xun then wrote about as a symbol of old thinking falling over. The site stayed a ruin for most of the twentieth century; the present tower, a steel frame with copper detailing, was built over the preserved foundation from December 2000 and opened on 25 October 2002. Its real fame comes from the Legend of the White Snake, in which the monk Fahai imprisons the White Lady beneath it.
What you’ll discover
Escalators carry you up the hillside from the road to the pagoda base, and inside there are lifts as well as stairs. The ground floor has a glass floor over the excavated original foundation, which is the most interesting thing in the building; a mezzanine holds Dongyang woodcarvings telling the White Snake story, and the upper floors hold displays on Wuyue pagodas, poetry about Leifeng in evening glow, and sculptures of the Ten Scenes, with a gilded dome and two thousand and two small gold pagodas at the top. The point of climbing it is the open gallery on the upper floor, which gives the best single overview of West Lake, the Su Causeway and the city skyline. The relics dug out of the old pagoda are in the Zhejiang Provincial Museum, not here.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- This is the viewpoint, not the monument. The building is 2002 and nobody should come for the architecture; come for the 360-degree view over the whole lake, which no other accessible high point gives you.
- Go for the last hour before sunset and stay. The scene it is named for is the pagoda in evening light, and from the gallery you get the sun going down behind the western hills and then the lake lighting up - then walk down and look back at the pagoda, which is floodlit, from across the water.
- The escalators up the hill are included and most people do not realise they are there, and trudge up the path instead.
- The paired scene is across the lake. Leifeng in the south and Baochu Pagoda on the north hill were built as a matched pair and are still described that way - 'Leifeng like an old monk, Baochu like a young beauty'. If you photograph one, look for the other.
- Read the White Snake story before you go in, or the woodcarving gallery and half the inscriptions are meaningless.
When to come
Late afternoon into dusk, for the view and for the scene the sight is named after. Autumn gives the clearest air; in summer haze the long view over the lake can be disappointing.
Getting around
One of the few genuinely accessible sights on West Lake. Escalators cover the hillside climb from road level, and lifts run inside the tower to the upper floors, so a wheelchair user or someone with a bad knee can reach the viewing gallery - which makes this the practical way to get a high view of the lake. The approach paths are paved. Confirm on the day that the escalators and lifts are running, as both have been out of service at times.
Worth knowing before you go
Go about an hour before sunset: the pagoda stays open late in summer and you get both the golden light on the lake and the lake lights coming on. Escalators go most of the way up the hill, so it is an easy climb.
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