By Rui Hu, EDITOR

The ancient salt-trading road lies along the Wuxi Daning River Scenic Spot. It records the five-thousand-year mysterious cultural symbols and bears the striving epic of ancestors of Mt. Wushan and Bashan, making it a vibrant and precious local tourism resource. Nowadays, many ancient trading roads have been deserted.

To protect this precious historical and cultural heritage, Wuxi County made every effort to restore it. Ningchang Ancient Town of Wuxi is one of the first salt-making sites in China, with a history of more than 4,000 years, and is known as an ancient salt capital worldwide and the originator of the world’s manual workshops. The old salt-trading road starts from Ningchang Ancient Town in Wuxi, runs through such places as Sichuan, Chongqing, Shaanxi, Hubei, Hunan, and Guizhou. Comprising nine branches, it is second only to the Silk Road and the Ancient Tea Horse Road in historical status.

It used to be the main road for salt transport, from which millions of people made a living. Sweat and footprints of generations of people were left on this road connecting East Sichuan and South Shaanxi. At present, over 3,000 kilometers of this ancient road has been discovered.

Due to historical changes, the rise of new industrial salt-making technique and the continuous improvement of traffic, the once prosperous ancient road gradually declined. To protect this historical and cultural brand, Wuxi invested over 10 million RMB from 2015 to 2018 to restore the ancient salt horse road s in two batches within the borders. The total restoration length of the ancient road this time reaches 8.1 kilometers, linking Ningchang Ancient Town, Hanfeng Mythical Valley, Daning Ancient Town, and other scenic spots.

Source: CQCB
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