Discover Kunming
Yuantong Temple
圆通寺
Kunming's oldest and busiest Buddhist temple, founded in the Tang era and unusual in being built downwards into a hollow, so you descend to the main hall across a bridge over a pond. Chinese Mahayana, Tibetan and Theravada traditions all have halls here.
The story
What makes this place special
Yuantong Temple is the largest Buddhist temple in central Kunming, first built in the late eighth or early ninth century under the Nanzhao kingdom. It was restored under the Ming in the Chenghua era, between 1465 and 1487, and expanded in 1686. It is unusual in plan because it sits in a hollow: the entrance is high and the main hall low, so you walk down into the temple rather than up through it. A later expansion at the rear, funded with Thai support, added a hall in Southeast Asian style, so the complex holds Chinese Mahayana worship and a Theravada-style hall on one site.
What you’ll discover
From the gate you descend a long flight of steps into a sunken courtyard, which gives you the rare experience of looking down on a temple's roofs as you arrive. At the bottom, Yuantong Hall stands in the middle of a pool crossed by bridges, with covered corridors along the water and two tall stone pillars carrying dragons inside the hall. Behind and above are the Copper Buddha Hall and the later Thai-funded hall with a reclining Buddha. The courtyard is full of incense smoke, caged birds, turtles in the pool and elderly worshippers.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- Go in the early morning for the actual service. This is a working temple with a resident community, and the chanting before about 08:30 is the reason to come rather than the architecture.
- The descent into the courtyard is the architectural point and it is easy to miss if you come in via the side entrance. Use the main gate on Yuantong Street.
- The vegetarian restaurant attached to the temple is one of the best cheap lunches in central Kunming and is used by locals rather than tourists.
- It is a ten-minute walk from Green Lake Park and next to Kunming Zoo on Yuantong Hill. Chaining the three into one flat afternoon works well.
- In the eighth lunar month and at Chinese New Year the courtyard is packed with worshippers and the incense is heavy; impressive, but not the visit for anyone with a chest complaint.
When to come
Before 09:00, for morning chanting, cool air and clear light into the sunken courtyard. Any season; the temple is pleasant in rain, as the corridors are covered.
Getting around
Difficult at the main entrance, because the whole temple is reached by a long descent of stone steps with no ramp and no lift, and you must climb back out. There is a side approach at a lower level that a determined wheelchair user can use with help; ask at the gate. The courtyard itself is flat paving, and the halls are entered over raised sills. A bad knee will find the stairs the hard part, not the visit.
Worth knowing before you go
Yuantong Street outside the gate turns into a cherry-blossom tunnel in March, and the temple's vegetarian restaurant is a cheap, genuinely good lunch.
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