A journey to the source of the dragon’s well. Or, finding the secret source of the purest Longjing Green Tea

After our blog entry about how Chinese made Yixing clay tea pots can find a justified place on a website dedicated to Taiwan’s teas and it’s uniquely rich tea culture, today, we are again exploring a cross-straight dilemma as we follow the same path to argue the case of allowing the intrusion of a Chinese tea in our selection. Right away we wish to mention that this is an exceptional measure and also circumstantial. Yet again, “how can we justify this?” – you will ask. Well, our case is supported by one sole argument: Whenever we find unquestionably unique teas that are made from the harmonious balance of tradition, a respectful use of the landscape and the environment, and are true authentic treasures of world tea culture, one must share this find with others in the true spirit of tea appreciation. And, when this find calls for an equally authentic and interesting story, we can only be compelled to share it even more! Follow us as we explore in many pictures and a few words the remote high mountain regions of Anhui and Zhejiang where the purest and cleanest Longjing teas come from. Is this authentic Longjing tea we’re talking about ? Read-on and you’ll be able to decide for yourself as we also lift the veil on some myths and dogmas in the world of tea by telling the story as it is.

Our destination and base for this trip was Huang Shan City in the province of Anhui (or Tunxi as it known locally). This is where my in-laws own an organic tea garden that produces Taiwanese style teas from imported Taiwanese developed strands. I was really looking forward to this visit since it coincided with the launch of the 2013 picking season at the garden and Spring picking was still in full swing in that part of China. What better context could we find for a trip that revolved around Spring tea sourcing and what better place to be based in when you are right in the middle of one of the mythical tea terroirs of this planet. Huang Shan, you’ve guessed, is known for Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea. It is also about an hour away from Huang Shan Park (a Unesco World Heritage Site), not far either from Qimen, the area better know for its famous black teas (known in the West as Keemum), and finally not far from the Eastern border to Zhejiang Province, famous most notably for Longjing green tea (also known under its literal translation: Dragon’s Well tea). It is towards those barely populated hills that extend up to above 2000 m that we were scheduled to spend a day roaming the narrow roads and trails in search of the cleanest and freshest Longjing green teas one can find.

China is a land of contrasts that can often be labelled as aberrations

Soon enough, one fortnight after our arrival last April 19th, a small van awaited us at the door of our hotel early in the morning. The weather was not perfect: wet and cold. But who cared! An adventure was ahead of us and adventurous minds know that the weather is never a deterrent in these circumstances. Our group consisted of two friends, my better half, myself, and our two guides. These last two were born in the hills we were heading towards. One of them helps out at the tea farm and is from a long lineage of tea gatherers, and the other, our experienced driver, used to be the one who drove the rations from the city up into the mountains back in the days when government issued ration stamps were the life line for several mountain communities. Needless to say, he knew the hills like the back of his hand and was our best ally if we wanted to get back to the hotel later that night. So, off we went into our rattling, locally made mini-van onto the toll highway heading towards Hangzhou for a little distance. China is a land of contrasts that can often be labelled as aberrations. There was not a soul on the highway apart from us, so much so that we had to wake the toll clerk to make him accept our money to get on. I let you envision how contrasting this deserted modern, tarmacked 4-lane snake with prominent English signage was with the surrounding rural and mountainous scenery on each side. Much like a fresh surgical scar, I felt. As we neared the border with Zhejiang, we left the highway to make our way into the luxurious forested mountains that surrounded the highway. Our speed decreased from 110 km/h to 50, and sometimes way less due to the obstacles and potholes that threatened to suck the wheels off of our vehicle more than once. The width of this dual carriageway was the equivalent of a single lane road. So, from this point on, we were offered, free of charge, an incessant concert of horn tooting that announced all bends and blind spots the road offered to us. That meant an average of 25 honks a minute, I kid you not. Here’s another contrast for you considering the tranquil scenery we were driving through. After an hour an half, we stopped in the middle of a village in front of a big house which seemed to be the nervous centre of this isolated community.

Vans and cars with all doors open were lined up in front of it and men were gathering and discussing vividly around bags laid on the ground next to the outside wall of the house. The front door of the house was open and men were going in and out in turns. Some carried bags in, some not. Our arrival didn’t go unnoticed and, we were immediately escorted inside of the house and all of the men outside followed us in as if part of an official procession. Somebody had connections, it seemed. We soon found out that we were invited inside our guide’s ancestral family house. There were 4 generations present to greet us, and as soon as we got in, glasses were prepared with leaves picked from the many meter high bags that lined the walls of the room. As soon as the hot water touched the leaves, our nose sent us a clear signal that we had penetrated into Longjing territory! What crisp, clean taste fresh Longjing has! And we drank infusion after infusion of water poured directly onto fresh leaves in our glasses. Sometimes we nibbled on them. I was indulging in eating them like chips by grabbing them directly from the opened bags all around the room. Leaves were changed from our glasses from time to time to follow the order of the lively discussions that the analysis of each bag necessitated. There was intense discussion around us about the merits of each tea. Most of us could only nod in approval at each lot. Sincerely, it was hard to find anything wrong with any bag we tested. There were differences in the taste that could be detected but nothing that could, even in the slightest way, be described as a negative characteristic. Each lot was superb, crisp and so clean! How can anything be wrong with such fresh tea! After an hour of drinking, and eating tea leaves we were invited to board our vehicle to continue our trek. I thought we had reached nirvana here and didn’t feel the need we go further but I offered no resistance being already tea drunk.

As we drove off, I was struggling to understand what we had just experienced and trying to connect some dots. A few questions got me to understand that we were invited to accompany our guide in one of his tea gathering trips. I use the word “gatherer” to describe our guide because I find it more fitting than “trader”. Periodically, during tea harvest season, he would climb up into the mountains to visit remote villages to gather small lots of finished tea. These small lots were evaluated, graded and maybe blended into bigger lots to be eventually brought to the big city markets of Hangzhou and Shanghai. Sometimes he would buy the tea from the makers to sell it and sometimes he simply served as a facilitator in transactions that didn’t involve him directly. One way or the other, he played a role in a network of independent players that each contributed an equally important part in the making and trading of tea coming out of these mountains. What we were to do for the remainder of the day was to go down the supply chain and meet all those players right down to the tea pickers. Our guide was very proud to mention that the teas made in these mountains was sold as authentic West Lake Longjing, even teas labelled as Shi Feng and Meijawu came from this area or where blended in along with teas emanating from these original famous growing areas further West. How much of this was true? I could not tell. But, what I could tell for sure is that what I had tasted in his ancestral house was by far the best Longjing teas I had the pleasure of tasting and that includes the famous Shi Fengs and Meijawus.

Our second stop was in a beautiful one street village called Yuantou stretched along a narrow strip between a mountain and a river in Zhejiang. As we arrived, the sun came out to highlight the bright tender green leaves that were just making their presence known at the tip of all the trees surrounding us. The village was spotless and clean, most of the house seemed strangely all new. As we walked towards an open garage door a rotating mechanical sound signalled us that tea was being finished. Surely enough a rotating drum tea frying machine was releasing a steady stream of flattened Longjing leaves. What a wonderful nutty roasted smell Freshly made Longjing tea has! And how crisp hot Longjing leaves are to munch on! If it wasn’t that expensive there would definitely be a market to promote these as a healthy snack! A charming couple greeted us with yet other rounds of tea tasting and, a wonderful lunch in what was the ground floor of their house. This ground floor consisted of a combination tea workshop and warehouse on one side and living/dining area on the other. Fresh fish from the stream behind the house and wild vegetables gathered from the surrounding hills was on the menu. Everything was luminously fresh and wholesome. and this impression was magnified by the pristine environment that surrounded us.

After lunch, our guest would also follow us as we continued our climb in a two vehicle procession. I was told that our guest is a tea maker (as opposed to a grower). The defining aspect of his title came from the fact that he owned machinery to make tea. And, he uses his machinery to make tea with leaves he would buy from pickers, sometimes he would make tea for others, or rent out his equipment for others to come and make tea at his house. This time, he would bring us to visit some of the villages where he finds his supply of leaves and meet some of the people that are part of his supply chain. As we continue to snake our way from valley to valley we arrive at a junction where tea trees seem to abound in more than patches here and there as we noticed on our way up. We seem to be surrounded by what could described as tea gardens yet, we notice no organized picking in groups but instead one head here and there picking away at single shrubs. The bushes, even if more density distributed on the hills, were not organised in rows but more so in a very organic way, just like nature intended it. A pair of pickers appeared on the road ahead of us carrying each a small basket. We stop by to chat them up and take a peak inside their baskets. Perfect pickings of two leaves and one bud were being carried up to the village for finishing in the village’s communal workshop. One day’s work was in that small basket. So, who owns the tea gardens surrounding us? — I asked. The village commune was the answer. Permission was granted by the authorities to plant tea trees in the surrounding mountains to build a livelihood for the community. Anyone from the community can go and pick from these bushes and everyone feels a responsibility to care for these semi-wild bushes since tea is the sole economic activity for these remote villages. As we arrived at the village, again we get treated to different teas to taste; each villager bringing his bag to have us sample. More tea is tasted and more lively discussion is had over the merits of one tea over the other. A lot of these discussions focussed solely on the appearance of the leaves as opposed to the taste of the tea. This is understandable since the appearance is quite often how the commercial value of a tea is evaluated. After all, not everybody gets to taste before buying, right?

The tea that we drank was in perfect symbiosis with the moment. Pure, authentic, multi-dimensional, timeless and blissfully indescribable.

Furthermore, we learn that each villager gets to make tea for himself, not just for the commune. So, everyone wanted to impress us with his personal stash and hopefully sell us a few jins. One man announces that he still had some pre-Qingming tea left at his house and invited us to come and give it a try. Our guide who knows the man strongly advises that we accept the invitation. It appears this quiet man has a special reputation. We find out that this gentleman lives in the highest village at the end of the road a few kms away. As we drive him up, we hear the story about how his village is deserted now since the authorities have deemed it unsafe to live in due to the high risk of landslides. He is one of the very few that sneaks up at night to go back to his house to sleep preferring the clean high mountain air of his eagle’s nest’s house than the newly built residences they’ve been offered in the village down below. As we arrive at the very end of the road, we could distinguish a patch of houses clinging one behind each other on a steep incline. All of them solidly build and featuring slate roofing. Tea bushes are scattered all around and people still come up to harvest them in the daytime. We make our way up a series of staircases to the house that appears to be crowning this small hamlet. That’s his house. We are simply silenced by the beauty and quietude bestowed upon us. Our host is also a man of a few words preferring to let his tea speak. He brings out a small bag of his precious pre-Qingming (very early Spring pickings considered by many Chinese as the best green tea one can get) Longjing tea onto the large front terrace in front of his house. He then proceeds to make tea in plastic cups on the ground surface in the middle of the terrace and serves us each a cup. I state that if simplicity is a determining characteristic of a tea ceremony, this was as ceremonious as it can get. We all sat around him on the ground and shared the tea that was offered to us, in near silence, lost in contentment and wishing that time could hold still a bit longer. The tea that we drank was in perfect symbiosis with the moment. Pure, authentic, multi-dimensional, timeless and blissfully indescribable.

As the sun started to dim, we thanked our host and honked our way back to the city with a few stops planned to drop off tea bags that were gathered during the trip and relieve over-active bladders from so much tea drinking.

Yes, the small bag of pre-Qingming Longjing tea followed us down the mountain.

Yes, this small bag of tea is now in Taiwan.

And yes, this small bag of tea is now waiting to be shared with all who desire. To all who will do so, we leave it up to you to decide if this is a truly authentic Longjing tea, or if this question is even worthy of any consideration.

 

Click on any picture to activate a slide show presentation of the pictures below.