Dengfeng lies below Mount Song, one of the five sacred mountains of China, and the temples scattered at its foot make up one of the densest clusters of historic buildings in Henan. Huishan Temple is part of that cluster, and it is the kind of place that most visitors drive straight past on the way to the Shaolin monastery, which is a pity. It sits quietly on the edge of Songyang, a town of sixty thousand people only five kilometres away, and it rewards anyone who stops to look.
The story here is the story of the whole mountain. For well over a thousand years Song has been where emperors came to perform rites and where monks, Daoists and scholars set up their retreats. The listing of the Dengfeng monuments "in the centre of heaven and earth" recognises that this was believed to be the middle of the world, and Huishan is one of the buildings in that group. The temple's long history includes the usual cycle of building, decay and restoration, and what you see is the product of many hands.
The riding around the foot of Song is pleasant rather than dramatic. The road from Zhengzhou or Luoyang crosses loess hills and farm country, then climbs gently toward the ridge, where the limestone and sandstone cliffs of the mountain suddenly show above the fields. There are decent corners on the approaches and enough variation to keep it interesting, but expect heavy traffic near the main tourist sites, and be careful about buses and tour coaches, which are not shy about the centre line.
Fuel and food are simple here. Songyang and Dengfeng have petrol stations and plenty of restaurants, and Zijinglu to the east is bigger still. Local noodles, steamed buns and the soups of Henan are good, honest fuel for a rider, and spring and autumn are the easiest seasons because summer can be hot and the winter wind off the mountain bites.
This particular stop is linked on the ride with the Longmen Grottoes and the Han-dynasty pass site, which shows how much history is packed into this one province. Take your time, because the temple is small and the hill behind it invites a short walk.