Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. Hilton describes Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from a lamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains. Shangri-La has become synonymous with any earthly paradise but particularly a mythical Himalayan utopia — a permanently happy land, isolated from the outside world. In the novel Lost Horizon, the people who live at Shangri-La are almost immortal, living years beyond the normal lifespan and only very slowly aging in appearance. The word also evokes the imagery of exoticism of the Orient. In the ancient Tibetan scriptures, existence of seven such places is mentioned as Nghe-Beyul Khimpalung. Khembalung is one of several beyuls believed to have been created by Padmasambhava in the 8th century as idylic, sacred places of refuge for Buddhists during times of strife.
The use of the term Shangri-La is frequently cited as a modern reference to Shambhala, a mythical kingdom in Tibetan Buddhist tradition, which was sought by Eastern and Western explorers; Hilton was also inspired by then-current National Geographic articles on Tibet, which referenced the legend.
The ancient city of Shangri-La, also known as Jiantang ancient city, built in the early Tang Dynasty. The ancient city is the hub of the Ancient Tea Horse Road, persevered the best and greatest of Tibetan residential group. There are more than six thousand inhabitants, mostly Tibetans. Housing are in Tibetan style: rugged stone road, eight lotus stretch in different directions, the stone of the houses, gray old color.
The weather was changing on plateau, sometimes dark clouds, while sometimes sun shining.
The world's largest prayer wheel
the moon that night
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