Dry Karst Cave Landscape

This is a type of karst cave in which the cave body is separated from the groundwater surface. The Ludi (Reef Flute) Cave in Guilin is a typical example. Informal statistics indicate that China has approximately 100,000 caves of various types. Most are dry karst caves. Generally, an individual cave is less than 5 km long, but the total length of the dry cave channels in a cave system is much longer. For example, the Shuanghe Cave in Guizhou Province is 117 km long, and the dry cave channel is more than 60 km long. The Jiangzhou Cave in Fengshan, Guangxi Province, is 37.9 km long, but its dry cave channel is more than 30 km long. Karst caves attract visitors due to their aesthetic and mystical nature, and they are not influenced by the seasons. They can be open to tourists for the entire year and hence are all-weather tourism resources. Approximately 600 karst caves have been opened to tourists, and most are dry karst caves. The development potential of this resource is enormous (Fig. 26)....