Über diese Reise
The experience of picking tea in a tea garden is common, but foraging wild tea is rare. It involves gathering untended wild tea on Cangshan Mountain, often in higher forests. Precisely because no one takes care of them, they grow completely naturally. Moreover, this will be a beautiful forest trip with a picnic tea break. Finally, we will turn the tea into white tea. The tea-picking season from April to June often coincides with the azalea blooming period.
Time: 13:00-16:00
Suitable age: 4 and up
Hiking distance: 3km, light hike
Season-limited: March 25 to July 1
Features: A spring seasonal activity
“I’m Xiaojing, and our favorite place is the forest. All year round, the mountain holds different treasures: mushrooms in the rainy season, pinecones, pine nuts, and ferns in autumn and winter. Each season has its own flowers and grasses. The girls in our foraging group always go up the mountain, no matter the season, and we always find something new. Join our mountain adventure!”
Five years ago, while walking on Cangshan, I came across a patch of wild tea. The untended tea trees were much taller than me. It was April when the tea tips were just perfect, too tempting. I used my shirt as a bag to bring some home, laid them on a bamboo tray to air-dry naturally, and they turned into white tea. In a way, foraging wild tea was my first door to understanding Cangshan.
Foraging wild tea is a kind of mountain game, a rustic fun. When you focus on searching for something in the forest, your mind is both concentrated and blank at the same time – it’s quite amusing.
After picking the tea, we will have a tea break together in a pine forest overlooking Erhai Lake. The tea break is prepared by us.
After the activity, we will take everyone's collected tea leaves home to dry and make white tea, then mail it to you.
The packaging box for the tea is shown below.
If you also want to join us to forage wild tea on the mountain, here’s what you need to know: The wild tea trees are untended and scattered in every corner of the forest. We search for them one by one like playing hide-and-seek, then pick their buds. It’s not easy – I once spent a whole day to get just half a kilogram of tea. If you just expect to pick enough tea to be worth 298 yuan, this might not be the right activity for you 😄.
Final product:
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