Chinese writer Tao Yuanming of the Eastern Jin Dynasty (317-420) once described in his work of a legendary fairyland "Peach Blossom Valley" - a place completely isolated from the rest of the world. People there lived a simple, pastoral life. For centuries, Chinese people merely regarded this valley as an imaginary place.

But does such a fairyland really exist in the real world? A trip to Bamei Village in Guangnan County of Southwest China's Yunnan Province will lead you to an unexpected answer.

  Journey to Bamei

After driving for over 40 kilometers north in Guangnan, where there is the border between Yunnan Province and South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, you will stop by a cave where there is a stream called Bamei River, which is the only way to reach Bamei Village.

Situated in a 30-square-kilometer fertile basin at an altitude of 700 meters, Bamei Village is sheltered by great amphitheatres of mountains.

Due to an inconvenient location and a hard transit, the village has escaped attacks by outsiders and the influences of the modern world, remaining as unadorned and pure as ever.

  Bamei Today

Reputed as one of the most isolated communities of the Zhuang minority in Guangnan, Bamei is a village without roads. Even today, the Bamei River is the only access in and out of the village.

At present Bamei is home to 119 families, mostly of the Zhuang minority.

As the story goes, about two or three hundred years ago, Bamei people's ancestors, at the time living in Guangdong, fled to Guangnan to avoid a political upheaval. Accidentally, they found Bamei - a land completely isolated from the outside world.

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