[Photo/ fjta.com]

Baishuiyang Water Square is located in the northeast Pingnan County, 170 km away from Fuzhou, and 120 km from downtown Ningde. Sitting at the upper reaches of Yuanyang River, it boasts the most spectacular scenery among the four major scenic districts along the river with a total area up to 77 square kilometers. It is surrounded by green mountains, and here converged two streams. The flat riverbed seems to be made up of one huge smooth rock, no sands or pebbles at all. Looking down from on high, you will marvel at its fantastic shape that resembles a vast newly ploughed field stretching among the sweeping mountains.

[Photo/ fjta.com]

This riverbed of 80,000 square meters, the world’s unique "shallow water square", consists of three giant flat rocks. The largest one is the size of 40,000 square meters, 182 m in width. As the water flows evenly over the riverbed, the vast surface of the river glistens and shimmers in the sunshine with a silvery sheen. That is why it is named “Baishuiyang”(which literally means "white water mass"). It extends over 2 km, divided into upper, middle and lower sections. The middle section is most impressive, which offers you an exceptional water ride along a 100-meter-long and 60-meter-wide natural flume. It is also called "a water flume in nature".

[Photo/ fjta.com]

These three huge rocks have been tentatively identified by the Chinese geologists as volcano lava, which, due to the crustal movement, is intruded by granites, and then after an indefinite period of time of water erosion, are shaped into this unique view of today. It earns Baishuiyang the name "the Heavenly Scenery and the Myth of the Universe". In 1994, it was listed as the National Key Scenic District and granted in 2005 National Geological Park by the Chinese Ministry of Land and Resources.

The lower reach of Yuanyang River is 18 km in length with a natural landscape of stream, waterfall, peak, rock, cave, pond and fog, together with wild mandarin ducks, macaques and rare plants. In late autumn each year, pairs of mandarin ducks come in thousands to the valley for the winter, so the place is named "Home of Mandarin Ducks" by the National Wildlife Protection Association and has become the only mandarin duck preservation area in China. By the stream are green mountains with great varieties of biological species. It is an ideal place not only for tourism, but also for scientific research.