Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range

This site includes several temples, shrines, pilgrimage routes and some nature scenery such as rivers, forests and waterfalls

Mikumari Shrine

This postcard was sent by Ai

Yoshino Mikumari Shrine is a Shinto shrine located on Mount Yoshino in Yoshino district, Nara, Japan.

The Shrine is dedicated to mikumari, a female Shinto kami associated with water, fertility and safe birth. Yoshino Mikumari Shrine is one of four important mikumari shrines in the former province Yamato. 

The presents day buildings go back to 1605, when Toyotomi Hideyori rebuilt the shrine, as his father Toyotomi Hideyoshi once had prayed here for a son and successor. - in: wikipedia

Seiganto-ji and Nachi Falls

This postcard was sent by Phoebe

Seiganto-ji, Temple of the Blue Waves, is a Tendai Buddhist temple in Wakayama Prefecture, Japan.

According to a legend, it was founded by the priest Ragyō Shōnin, a monk from India. The temple was purposely built near Nachi Falls, where it may have previously been a site of nature worship.

Nachi Falls in Nachikatsuura, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan, is one of the best-known waterfalls in Japan. With a drop of 133 meters (and 13 meters wide), it is the country's tallest water fall with single uninterrupted drop; however, the tallest waterfalls with multiple drops in Japan are Hannoki Falls, at 497 m (seasonal), and Shomyo Falls, at 350m (year round). - in: wikipedia

Okunoin

This postcard was sent by Claus

Kōyasan chōishi-michi is a twenty-four kilometre path with a stone marker (ishi) every 109 metres (chō) leading to Kōyasan, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. Created by Kūkai and within the Kōyasan Chōishi-michi Tamagawa Prefectural Park, it forms part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site: Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range.

The path leads from Jison-in at the foot of Mount Kōya to Danjō Garan, a distance of just under twenty kilometres (one hundred and eighty markers). It is a further four kilometres to Kūkai's mausoleum in the Okunoin (thirty-six markers). - in: wikipedia

Hiraizumi – Temples, Gardens and Archaeological Sites Representing the Buddhist Pure Land

This was my first postcard from Japan and arrived through Postcrossing. I was extremely happy when I received it because it's not the most popular site of Japan. This property is a group of five sites

Chūson-ji

This postcard was sent by Toshio

Chūson-ji is a Buddhist temple in Hiraizumi, Iwate Prefecture, Japan. It is the head temple of the Tendai sect in Tōhoku (northeastern Japan). The Tendai sect claims that the temple was founded in 850 by Ennin, the third chief abbot of the sect.

The Konjiki-dō or 'Golden Hall' is a mausoleum containing the mummified remains of the leaders of the Northern Fujiwara clan who ruled much of northern Japan in the 12th century. It is one of two buildings that survive from the original Chūson-ji temple complex, the other being a sutra repository. - in: wikipedia

The five sites (in red what I have):

• Chūson-ji
• Mōtsū-ji
• Kanjizaiō-in Ato
• Muryōkō-in Ato
• Mount Kinkeisan

West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou

The West Lake is a freshwater lake where there are numerous temples, pagodas, gardens and artificial islands.  This lake inspired poets and painters and influenced other gardens in the rest of China, Japan and Korea 

Broken Bridge

This postcard was sent by San-Aiolia

Broken Bridge, located in the eastern end of the Bai Causeway in Hangzhou West Lake, is the most well known bridge among numerous big or small ancient and modern bridges in the West Lake.

It is said that as early as in the Tang Dynasty, this bridge was built. The existing bridge is a arched stone bridge built in 1921 which is 8.8 meters in length and 8.6 meters in width. Though it went through heavy repair, its simple and elegant style is still essentially unchanged. - in: http://www.topchinatravel.com/china-attractions/broken-bridge.htm

Leifeng Pagoda

Leifeng Pagoda is a five-storey tower with eight sides, located on Sunset Hill south of the West Lake in Hangzhou, China. Originally constructed in the year AD 975, it collapsed in 1924 but was rebuilt in 2002. Since then it has been a popular tourist attraction. - in: wikipedia

Kaiping Diaolou and Villages

This UNESCO site, with beautiful towers, comprises four villages. So far I have two postcards but both of the same village

Zili Village

This postcard was sent by Bosen

Diaolous are fortified multi-storey watchtowers, generally made of reinforced concrete. These towers are located mainly in Kaiping County, Guangdong province, China.

The first towers were built during the Ming Dynasty, reaching a peak in the 1920s and 1930s, when there were more than three thousand of these structures.

Zili Village

This postcard was sent by Yunshui

Today, approximately 1,833 diaolou remain standing in Kaiping, and approximately 500 in Taishan. They can also occasionally be found in numerous other areas of Guangdong, such as Shenzhen and Dongguan. Although the diaolou served mainly as protection against forays by bandits, a few of them also served as living quarters.

Kaiping has traditionally been a region of major emigration abroad, and a melting pot of ideas and trends brought back by overseas Chinese. As a result, many diaolou incorporate architectural features from China and from the West. - in: wikipedia

The four villages (in red what I have):

• Yinglong Lou (at Sanmenli Village)
• Zili Village and the Fang Clan Watch Tower
• Majianlong Village Cluster
• Jingjiangli Village

Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art Cultural Landscape

This is one of the postcards that arrived in worst shape to my mailbox. It even has an apologize message of the Swiss Post Service. Fortunately the sender was very kind and sent me another card that arrived in good condition

Huashan Rock Art

This postcard was sent by Chenzhan

Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art Cultural Landscape are an extensive assembly of historical rock art that were painted on limestone cliff faces in Guangxi, southern China over a period of several hundred years at least. The paintings are located on the west bank of the Ming River which is a tributary of the Zuo River.

The main painted area along the cliff has a width of about 170 metres (560 ft) and a height of about 40 metres (130 ft) and is one of the largest rock paintings in China. 

Huashan Rock Art

This postcard was sent by Chenzhan

The paintings are believed to be between 1800 and 2500 or between 1600 and 2400 years old. The period of their creations hence spans the times from the Warring States period to the late Han Dynasty in the history of China. Many of the paintings are thought to "illustrate the life and rituals" of the ancient Luo Yue people, who are believed to be ancestors of the present-day Zhuang people and inhabited the valley of Zuo River during this period. However, recent carbon dating suggests that the oldest paintings were executed around 16,000 years ago whereas the youngest are around 690 years old. - in: wikipedia

Wadi Rum Protected Area

Wadi Rum, also known as the Valley of the Moon, was used as a background setting in several films like Lawrence of Arabia, Red Planet and The Martian 

This postcard was sent by Steffi

The 74,000-hectare property, inscribed as a mixed natural and cultural site, is situated in southern Jordan, near the border with Saudi Arabia. It features a varied desert landscape consisting of a range of narrow gorges, natural arches, towering cliffs, ramps, massive landslides and caverns. Petroglyphs, inscriptions and archaeological remains in the site testify to 12,000 years of human occupation and interaction with the natural environment. The combination of 25,000 rock carvings with 20,000 inscriptions trace the evolution of human thought and the early development of the alphabet. The site illustrates the evolution of pastoral, agricultural and urban activity in the region. - in: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1377/

Landscape of Grand Pré

Grand Pré was made famous by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem Evangeline, about a girl who search her love lost in the expulsion of the Acadians

Grand Pré

This postcard was sent by CJ

Grand-Pré is a Canadian rural community in Kings County, Nova Scotia. Its French name translates to "Great/Large Meadow" and the community lies at the eastern edge of the Annapolis Valley several kilometres east of the town of Wolfville on a peninsula jutting into the Minas Basin surrounded by extensive dyked farm fields, framed by the Gaspereau and Cornwallis Rivers.

Grand-Pré was founded in about 1680 by Pierre Mellanson, an Acadian settler who traveled east from Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons's original settlement at Port-Royal.

During the French and Indian War (the North American theatre of the Seven Years' War), the Acadians were expelled from Grand-Pré during the Bay of Fundy Campaign (1755).

Acadians from Grand Pré were dispersed in many locations and some eventually returned to other parts of the Canadian Maritimes such as Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and New Brunswick. Many Acadians expelled from the Grand Pré area eventually settled in the New England States and travelling overland to South Louisiana in the United States after being dropped on the Atlantic coast.

After the deportation of the Acadians, the vacant lands were resettled by New England Planters in 1760 and renamed Horton Township. in: wikipedia