There is an open scenic spot by the roadside between the south and north entrances of Nanjian Earth Forest, where visitors can go deep into the bottom of the earth forest without any barriers, stepping into this erosion landform that began forming during the Cretaceous Ice Age. Looking up from eyebrow height to the top of the earth forest, only a few dozen meters away, it might take just a second, but such a deep geological layer took tens of thousands or even billions of years to form. Geologists use the term "deep time" to describe such a long geological history. British writer Robert Macfarlane has a book called "Underland: A Deep Time Journey," which is about a dark quest for knowledge in the underground world. But here, in Nanjian Earth Forest, visitors can also embark on a deep time journey above the ground.
Nanjian Earth Forest has a wooden staircase that runs through the entire scenic area covering about 500 hectares. Along this boardwalk for visitors to walk and admire, every unique feature of the earth forest can be seen. The upright earth pillars outside the railing are so close that you can touch them. The uneven marks on the surface twist like earthworms or wrinkles on an old man's face—these are clear imprints of wind and rain erosion. Only the most solid soil has stood firm after billions of years of erosion, while its contemporaries from the same period have long been washed away by water to unknown places. They look so solid that one might think they have turned to rock, but in fact, they are still fragile and soft. A gentle press can leave fingerprints, and the gravel embedded between soil layers can be pulled out without much effort. If the climate changes drastically and a heavy rainstorm hits, no one knows how many earth pillars will collapse into a pool of muddy water.
Here, wind and rain are carving knives, and nature has sculpted many vivid and lifelike forms: towering spires like European Gothic cathedrals, solemn and majestic; a wise and learned Confucius statue, with a diligent young student beside him, teaching with virtue; an easily defended castle with visible railings, as if a well-trained guard patrols inside; a graceful maiden singing and dancing on a high platform, ethereal as a fairy; and countless statues of gods standing quietly in a painting-like forest, sparking intense spiritual resonance, with the moaning wind like something from distant outer space.
Standing on the boardwalk at the top of Nanjian Earth Forest, looking down at the deepest and farthest ravines of the ochre earth forest, the view drifts from the nearest present to the Ice Age when dinosaurs lived. In this fantastic journey through time and space, humans become towering giants, watching a cataclysmic change from a height beyond the boundaries of time and space. Dinosaurs shrink into crawling ants, and soil erosion caused by rain becomes a catastrophic geological event like a landslide. The dinosaur ants have no escape, buried under rolling boulders, eventually going extinct. When everything settles, the dinosaurs' home becomes the birthplace of a new species, and a new era begins...
