Living on the edge of a cliff

Translated from Portuguese from Mundo Gump

There are some people who are afraid of heights. There are certain places that are not appropriate for these people. This is why there are courageous people live on the side of cliffs. You have to have a dose of courage to live on these rocks. Look below:

Monks on the side of the mountain:

Built over 1,400 years ago in the Jinlong Mountains, in the province of Shanxi, this monastery is one of a kind! Not only because of its architectual  complexity, built on the edge of a cliff, but also by its richness of details, mixing Taoist, Confusionist, and Buddhist details.

The monastery is composed of several pavilions that are based in natural rock formations and are linked by catwalks, hallways, and stairs.

Its height protects it from floods, from rain and snow, from rockslides, and from the heat of the mountains around it. The monastery has

It looks like a canvas painting!

It’s unbelievable, but this is a photo. This monastery is on the edge of a cliff, 1,000 meters above the pointy rocks below. The monastery is in Bhutan. According the legend of the second Buddha, Guru Rinpoche was built in 1692. The Buddhist monastery admits a small number of tourists for meditation periods. This is for those that have cold blood.

Residents on the edge

The residents of the town of Ronda, Spain are already at an altitude of 750 m above sea level. Not only that, they live right on the edge of a natural cliff that produces a canyon that is not less than 100 m deep. Ronda is in Malaga. The cliff separates the modern and old parts of the city.

It is possible to cross from one side of the other because three bridges have been built throughout history.

70 meters above the Mediterranean Sea

This is Boniface on the southern part of the island of Corsica. There are a few thousand residents on the edge of the cliff that hangs over the Mediterranean Sea. The mountains were gradually eroded by wind and sea, resulting in this beautiful- and frightening- area to live.

More Spaniards on the edge

In Castellfolit de la Roca, in Catalonia, there is a cliff approximately 1 km wide were people have built houses on a cliff about 50 m high.

The cliff was made by two layers of volcanic lava. 

In paradise 300 meters high.

Called by many, the “rich person’s slum”, the island of Santorini, in Greece, is one of the most interesting landscapes of the world. With its white buildings on the rocks 300 meters above the blue waters of the Aegean Sea, this place remains of the most traditional and romantic destinations of the world.

Santorini is the place where the most people live on the side of a cliff in the world. If it’s not, it’s certainly the richest cliff.

Wonderful view

Speaking of rich slums and people hanging on cliffs over the sea, here is Manarola. This place is in Italy and is considered one of the five unforgettable destinations in Italy.

Sophistication on the top of the hill

Still in Italy, we have the Almafi Coast. It is an expensive place for rich people that drink wine looking at the sea and eating real Italian food. It is only 56 km from Naples and 280 km from Rome, in southern Italy, the Almafi coast offers a full view of green cliffs covered with Byzantine style homes, surrounded by an astonishing blue sea.

For the Insane!

As expected, I would not miss the chance to show the most bizarre place in the world to visit to close this post.

Mount Huashan is one the five holy mountains of China. It is in the Himalayas and monks scaled this mountain to build their homes. Thousands of visitors per year risk their very own lives to come to this curious place.

There are many ways to come up different sides, and the east side is nothing less than 2,090 meters! This means one thing:

STAIRS! AND LOTS OF STAIRS!

Among them are the most vertical stairs that exist.

Getting there involves crossing small wooden planks tied precariously to the rock with rusty old chains.

Maybe this is why their faith is strengthened in these places, hehehe

The highest side of the mountain is the southern route which forces the brave visitor to climb 2,160 meters.

This is definitely not a place for sissies who are afraid of heights.

The 55th Aniversary of the Mt Everest Ascent

On May 29, 1953, the first ascent of Mount Everest was completed- 

Mount Everest, also called Chomolungma, Qomolangma or Zhumulangma (in in Chinese: 珠穆朗玛峰 Zhūmùlǎngmǎ Fēng) or Sagarmatha (Nepali: सगरमाथाmeaning Ocean Head) is the highest mountain on Earth, as measured by the height of its summit above sea level, which is 8,848 metres or 29,029 feet. The mountain, which is part of the Himalaya range in High Asia, is located on the border between Sagarmatha Zone, Nepal and China.

In 1953, a ninth British expedition, led by John Hunt, returned to Nepal. Hunt selected two climbing pairs to attempt to reach the summit. The first pair (Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans) came within 100 m (300 feet) of the summit on 26 May, but turned back after becoming exhausted. As planned, their work in route finding and breaking trail and their caches of extra oxygen were of great aid to the following pair. Two days later, the expedition made its second and final assault on the summit with its second climbing pair, the New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay from Nepal. They reached the summit at 11:30 a.m. local time on May 29, 1953 via the South Col Route. At the time, both acknowledged it as a team effort by the whole expedition, but Tenzing revealed a few years later that Hillary had put his foot on the summit first. They paused at the summit to take photographs and buried a few sweets and a small cross in the snow before descending.

Here is Google’s image to commemorate the event-