Shangri-La City

Shangri-La
香格里拉市 · སེམས་ཀྱི་ཉི་ཟླ་གྲོང་ཁྱེར།
County-level city

Old Town of Jiantang

Location of Shangri-La County (pink) and Dêqên Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (yellow) within Yunnan
Shangri-La

Location of the county seat in Yunnan

Coordinates: 27°50′N 99°42′E / 27.833°N 99.700°E / 27.833; 99.700
Country People's Republic of China
Province Yunnan
Prefecture Dêqên
Area
 • Total 11,613 km2 (4,484 sq mi)
Elevation[1] 3,160 m (10,370 ft)
Population
 • Total 130,000
 • Density 11/km2 (29/sq mi)
Time zone China Standard (UTC+8)
Postal code 674400
Area code(s) 0887
Website www.shangri-la.gov.cn
Shangri-La City
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese 香格里拉
Traditional Chinese 香格里拉
Former Chinese names
Simplified Chinese 中甸
Traditional Chinese 中甸
Tibetan name
Tibetan སེམས་ཀྱི་ཉི་ཟླ།

Shangri-La is a county-level city in northwestern Yunnan province, People's Republic of China and is the location of the seat of the Dêqên Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture.

Name

In the second half of the 20th century Shangri-La was called Zhongdian (Chinese: 中甸 Zhōngdiàn) but was renamed on 17 December 2001 as Shangri-La (other spellings: Semkyi'nyida, Xianggelila, or Xamgyi'nyilha) after the fictional land of Shangri-La in the 1933 James Hilton novel Lost Horizon, in an effort to promote tourism in the area. The original Tibetan population previously refers to this place by its traditional name Gyalthang or Gyaitang (Standard Tibetan: རྒྱལ་ཐང།; Wylie: rgyal thang, ZWPY: Gyaitang), meaning "Royal plains". This ancient name is reflected in the Tibetan Pinyin name of the town of Jiantang (建塘; Jiàntáng), the county seat.

Towns

In the early morning of January 11, 2014, a fire broke out in the 1,000-year-old Dukezong Tibetan neighborhood. About 242 homes and shops were destroyed and 2,600 residents were displaced.[2] About half of the old town was destroyed by the fire, half was spared. After the fire residents were allowed back to their homes and shops. By the end of 2014 rebuilding had started and tourism started to come back. Generally tourism was not affected by the fire, since the main sights in the old town, such as the prayer wheel and temples were not damaged. Many of the other main sights are located outside of the old town.

Climate

Shangri-La has a monsoon-influenced humid continental climate (Köppen Dwb), due to the high elevation. Winters are chilly but sunny, with a January 24-hour average temperature of −3.2 °C (26.2 °F), while summers are cool, with a July 24-hour average temperature of 13.5 °C (56.3 °F), and feature frequent rain; more than 70% of the annual precipitation is delivered from June to September. The annual mean is 5.85 °C (42.5 °F). Except during the summer, nights are usually sharply cooler than the days. Despite the dryness of the winter, the small amount of precipitation is generally sufficient to cause major transportation dislocations and isolate the area between November and March.

Climate data for Shangri-La (1971−2000)
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Record high °C (°F) 18.3
(64.9)		 16.2
(61.2)		 21.5
(70.7)		 22.7
(72.9)		 24.2
(75.6)		 25.6
(78.1)		 25.4
(77.7)		 25.1
(77.2)		 23.8
(74.8)		 20.9
(69.6)		 18.8
(65.8)		 17.9
(64.2)		 25.6
(78.1)
Average high °C (°F) 6.3
(43.3)		 6.7
(44.1)		 9.2
(48.6)		 12.5
(54.5)		 17.0
(62.6)		 19.2
(66.6)		 19.3
(66.7)		 18.9
(66)		 17.4
(63.3)		 14.7
(58.5)		 11.0
(51.8)		 8.2
(46.8)		 13.4
(56.1)
Daily mean °C (°F) −3.2
(26.2)		 −0.9
(30.4)		 2.2
(36)		 5.4
(41.7)		 9.7
(49.5)		 13.1
(55.6)		 13.5
(56.3)		 12.8
(55)		 11.3
(52.3)		 7.0
(44.6)		 1.6
(34.9)		 −2.3
(27.9)		 5.9
(42.6)
Average low °C (°F) −11.2
(11.8)		 −7.4
(18.7)		 −3.6
(25.5)		 −0.5
(31.1)		 3.4
(38.1)		 8.4
(47.1)		 9.8
(49.6)		 9.1
(48.4)		 7.4
(45.3)		 1.3
(34.3)		 −5.8
(21.6)		 −10.6
(12.9)		 0.0
(32)
Record low °C (°F) −23.9
(−11)		 −20.2
(−4.4)		 −17.5
(0.5)		 −10
(14)		 −7.4
(18.7)		 −2.1
(28.2)		 1.1
(34)		 1.0
(33.8)		 −3
(27)		 −11.1
(12)		 −16.5
(2.3)		 −27.4
(−17.3)		 −27.4
(−17.3)
Average precipitation mm (inches) 7.8
(0.307)		 14.4
(0.567)		 34.8
(1.37)		 32.4
(1.276)		 25.9
(1.02)		 80.2
(3.157)		 157.4
(6.197)		 151.3
(5.957)		 80.6
(3.173)		 44.5
(1.752)		 12.7
(0.5)		 4.9
(0.193)		 646.9
(25.469)
Average precipitation days (≥ 0.1 mm) 4.2 6.6 9.3 11.1 11.5 17.9 23.2 23.1 19.3 10.1 4.0 2.1 142.4
Source: Weather China

National park

Gandan Sumtseling Monastery
Tibetan houses in the outskirts of Shangri-La

Transport

See also

References

Further reading

External links

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Shangrila.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Xamgyi'nyilha County.

Coordinates: 27°50′N 99°42.1′E / 27.833°N 99.7017°E / 27.833; 99.7017

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