Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site and Hutian Ancient Kiln Site

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site

   Few words travelled the world quite like kaolin. It comes from Gaoling, which means High Ridge, a hill village in Jiangxi province where a pure white clay was dug for centuries and sent to the porcelain kilns of Jingdezhen. French missionaries in the eighteenth century took samples of this clay back to Europe, and the Chinese place name became the English and French word for the key ingredient in porcelain. So this ordinary-looking hillside is where one of the most famous materials in the world got its name.

   Read the complete Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site is where the day begins. Next is Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S.

2. 2. Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S

   For a thousand years, the best porcelain in China, and for much of that time the best in the world, came from Jingdezhen. The city, in the north east of Jiangxi province, grew up around imperial kilns that produced fine ceramics for the emperors, and its blue and white porcelain was exported across Asia, the Middle East and Europe. The secret of its success lay partly in the hills around the city, where the white clay known as kaolin was mined. The word kaolin itself comes from Gaoling, a village in the hills north east of Jingdezhen, where the clay was first dug. The point on this ride lies in that countryside, between the city and the old clay mines, in a landscape of wooded hills, tea plantations, rivers and villages.

   Read the complete Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S comes up about 28 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hutian Ancient Kiln Site.

3. 3. Hutian Ancient Kiln Site

   Jingdezhen has been making porcelain for more than a thousand years, and the Hutian kiln site is one of the places where that story began to turn into an industry. The kilns here produced fine white and bluish-white ware in the Song and Yuan dynasties, and the heaps of broken shards and the remains of long dragon-shaped kilns show how potters adapted slopes of land to fire great quantities of pots at once. Later, in the Ming dynasty, imperial kilns were established in the town itself, and Jingdezhen became the porcelain capital of China, supplying emperors and, via the sea trade, markets from Japan to Europe.

   Read the complete Hutian Ancient Kiln Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 53 km into the recorded legs you reach Hutian Ancient Kiln Site. Next is back through Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S.

4. 4. back through Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry S, late in the day. Next is Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site.

5. 5. Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Gaoling Porcelain Clay Mining Site. That is the ride.