@movernie
Our family are buddhist and we often visited the Cham Shan Temple 湛山精舍 located at the Bayview/Steeles location in Richmond Hill. Over the years, Cham Shan Temple will collect donations from worshippers such as our family to help maintain the Cham Shan Temple as well as a big project called “Wutai Shan” located in Peterborough.
Growing up, we often hear about this big project but we know it’s a long construction task to do. Fast forward over 30+ years, the majority of the construction for Wutai Shan 五台山佛教花園 has been built. There are still lots of work to be done and it will be a long process of getting all the architecture to be complete, but we can see progress.
Today was a beautiful sunny day, not too hot and not too cold, since it’s Father’s Day weekend, I have decided to bring my parents to Wutai Shan just to see what the property looks like.
It took about 1 hour and 20 minutes each way from Markham to Wutai Shan located in the Peterborough area but since this week I am test driving the all-new 2025 Mazda CX-70, the ride was comfortable and a very enjoyable journey to Wutai Shan.
We knew we have arrived at Wutai Shan when we spotted a golden statue from a far. As we arrived at the entrance, you could see how big this piece of land is!!!! This place is huge! There are slopes of mountains and trees surrounding entire area. It’s pretty much “in the middle of nowhere” with no heavy traffic, very little human beings or nearby residential area or shopping centre, Wutai Shan is truly a very peaceful and quiet place for people to mediate.
The entrance is spacious and very wide and I believe on normal days, we may have to pay for parking as there were gates and ticket machine to print out a ticket before we can entered. But for some reason, both gates were opened already today so today was free parking.
There are various parking areas for the visitors as this place is massive. My 1st impression was that…you have to drive to different places in order to visit different god and statues. For P1 and P2, you can park and then visit the outdoor giant laughing happy buddha. After a short flight of stairs, you could see the laughing buddha.
After that, we hopped back on our Mazda CX-70 and drive around, we drove through a man-made lake, then there was a golden statue up in a slope and then there was another spot that’s called “Land God”, so you can park at different places and walk up to these various buildings or statues.
The main attraction was the main temple which is a long gradual slope up in the slope. I recommend you drive your vehicle up on a 1-way slope up and then park at the parking area at the main temple.
It’s truly beautiful up there at the main temple overlooking the entire property. It’s peaceful and really relaxing.
As you walked into the main building, there was a donation station, souvenir station, cafeteria station and a you walked into a big room, the monks were going through a special service. So, please always be mindful and respectful when you are visiting any temples. No swearing, don’t wear inappropriate clothing and be respectful and don’t laugh or run around. Be respectful!
This main temple was very grand with shiny marble floors throughout. However, if it’s wet, it could become slippery so please walk with cautious.
As I walked up the 4 flights of stairs, I could see another temple, it’s surrounded by beautiful wooden doors and walls. As I entered, there were many golden god statues for us to pray and pay our respects.
This whole temple is massive that it would take a few hours just to visit everything. For those who requires elevators and can’t walk all the stairs, not to worry, there are ramps throughout the temple for you to use your wheelchairs.
There are elevators that can bring you up from the ground of the main temple up to another temple.
Overall, this Wutai Shan Buddhist Temple is beautiful, we can really see where the $ went to and it’s not even fully finished yet. There are still more buildings that needed to be completed.
I highly recommend you to come pay a visit. Whether you are a buddhist or not, it will become a tourist attraction and worthwhile to visit this special place.
Wutai Shan Buddhist Garden – Peterborough, Ontario, Canada
Website
Address: 708 Ski Hill Rd, Cavan-Monaghan, ON L0A 1A0
Phone: (705) 991-0708
Google Maps: https://maps.app.goo.gl/ScGz2dVFqtfKWSHq5
