Chongqing · Outdoor
Mountain City Cliffside Trail (Shancheng Third Lane)
山城第三步道
Cliffside walkway along the old mountain-city trail, part boardwalk and part lane, with tea stops along the way.
What you’ll do
Cliffside walkway along the old mountain-city trail, part boardwalk and part lane, with tea stops along the way.
- Best for
- Travellers who want to see how the city was built into a cliff rather than on top of it.
- Travel party
- Solo, Couple, Friends
- Skip this if
- Anyone with mobility limits, since there are long stair sections
- How long
- 90–180 min
- Cost per person
- CNY 0–30
- When it opens
- daylight hours
- Best time to go
- late afternoon for the river light
- Do I need to book?
- Not required
- How early?
- not needed
- Can foreign visitors join?
- easy
- Language help
- medium (no English interpretation on site)
- How to book
- not required
Where to book
We have not found a booking option we are confident recommending yet.
How we checked it
Verified · 2026-09-26
Shancheng Xiang, also called the Third Mountain City Walkway, is the busiest of Chongqing's 17 built cliffside walkways and is free with no booking. Sources agree on roughly 1.7 km end to end and 1.5-3 hours with stops. The lanes are open around the clock while the cafes, teahouses and craft shops keep roughly 10:00-22:00, and the lanterns come on about 19:30. The one thing worth telling readers is the direction: start at the Consular Lane (Lingshi Xiang) entrance near Qixinggang metro exit 1 on Lines 1 and 10 and walk downhill, because starting from Zhongxing Road means climbing the whole way. Free stops along the route are the Ren'ai Hall ruins and wilderness garden, the cantilevered plank walkway about 70 m above the river, and the Houshe mansion; the Shancheng Shiguang library charges CNY 5 for its reading room and tea is optional. Budget is recorded as 0 to 30 to cover a tea or a snack, not an entry fee.
Trip.com source ↗ · checked 2026-09-26