Visit the secret tea town among the vast mountains and rivers

In August, the land of Cangwu seems to have not yet emerged from the arrogance of the hot summer, and it is still difficult to cool. In a row of workshops with blue brick walls, blue tile roofs and mixed structures of masonry and wood, four or five men are busy, and the diffuse tea fragrance slightly relieves the discomfort caused by humidity. Steam rose from the teapot and I looked up at the bamboo baskets. In addition to Liubao tea, there are clouds of black leaves, pieces of tea fruits, strings of tea stems and dried calyx ... can these be used as tea?

"It's delicious," the man in a white short-sleeved shirt said mysteriously to me. He grabbed a cup of tea and handed it to the guest. Hot mountain spring water is slowly brewed into a bowl with hot water vapor, and a wisp of fragrance gradually floats into the teahouse. I smell the smell of cooked millet that I have never met before. He told me that the tea in his hand had the saying that the king of Liubao "bit the copper coin". Sacrifice in the Spring and Autumn Period and Social Day are important festivals for Liubao people to worship the land gods, generally around March 18 in the solar calendar. The tea in front of the club tastes mellow, rich and sweet. Her production may not be as exquisite as cooked tea, but this kind of tea not only has a history, but also has a different charm. Growing in the deep ditch of Liubao, fresh leaves have been shaken, de-enzymed, twisted, dried, stacked and other traditional techniques, giving off a specious smell of pine smoke. When hot water is injected into the teapot, the strong pine smoke fragrance that has been sealed is awakened again and sprayed out.

? "Yes, it is the tea party in front of the club. You didn't drink? "

? I also took a sip and nodded solemnly, thinking: it's fine, but it's tea again. But to say the least, this is really good tea. This is the first batch of tea in early spring, that is, pre-meeting tea, which is definitely rarer than pre-Ming tea.

? "Only the cables of purple bud tea will be so curly and tight! You see, this tea is slightly darker than fried green. In addition to the fresh fragrance of green tea, there is also the aroma of cooked millet. Drinking in your mouth has a wide aroma, obvious sweetness and extremely low bitterness ... at least ten years-a good thing! "

He sucked tea loudly from the cup, frowned for a while, poured the residue from the cup into the tea set, and suddenly burst into endless praise.

Liubao Tea Factory built in 1976 (photo by Huang Lihua)

? We are in an old factory building with blue bricks and tiles, which was built in the 1970s. Less than 2 kilometers from Liubao Town. On the north side of the Tropic of Cancer, the annual average temperature is 265,438 0.2℃, and the best original old tree Liubao tea leaves grow in the world.

The silence in the afternoon spread like a spider's web among the remaining high walls. Direct sunlight shines directly on the cooktops of several water-killing stoves. I saw some shiny dust flying in the light column. Surrounded by big bags full of tea leaves, these tea leaves are planted in the tea garden outside the factory. The man in a white short-sleeved shirt is called Qin Shanhang. He is the director in charge of production in this tea factory, and he is from Baise, Guangxi. After introducing me to the traditional production technology of ancient Liubao tea, he emphasized that the old tea woman is the most authentic Liubao tea. Although the old tea woman is classified as coarse tea, she is also particular about picking. Generally, old tea leaves are only picked three days before and after the first frost. These tea leaves will be stored in a laundry basket after steam, water fishing, water deactivation, drying and other production processes. Of course, some people arrange tea pieces, string them up and hang them on the wall, or put them on the stove to dry, just like northerners hang corn skewers under the eaves. After standing for many years, it is difficult to be confused with cooked tea after heap fermentation. The moment you first entered, you thought it was a factory tea with three or four leaves in one bud, but it was actually an old tea woman, full of smoke. This kind of tea is the same as that produced in Jiangnan in Ming Dynasty, but it still tastes like new tea no matter how many years it has been aged. Unfortunately, it has been lost now! The old tea woman is still drinking, and there is always a unique, sweet medicinal or floral fragrance. Finally, Qin Shanhang told me cheerfully that they still have this kind of production process.

In a hot and humid place like Liubao, it takes enough years for tea to transform naturally. Drinking this tea is like getting an old jade. It doesn't necessarily have elaborate craftsmanship, even it looks clumsy, but it's all the breath brought by time, delicious and moist. Anyway, I told him frankly that I prefer another drink. "Is it coffee?" The owner of the tea garden sneered and asked, "Coffee has no medical value-but drinking four cups of tea a day can prevent indigestion, heart disease and comprehensive dysfunction."

I asked Qin Shanhang how many drinks a day?

"Five or six cups," he replied cheerfully.

? "How many years does it take for ordinary raw tea to reach such an aging state?"

"For at least twenty years," he said proudly, "Liubao tea is more fragrant with age. The time cost of daily drinking like this is really a bit high. "

? Who would have thought that the sunny town of Liubao was once a sad place? This ancient town in Lingnan, which is rich in black tea, has been plagued by wars and bandits for hundreds of years since the Opium War. According to historical records, "from the last years of Daoguang to the autumn of Xianfeng seven years, there has been no change for 200 years ... those who recruit strong and brave are scattered as thieves." At first, they robbed along the river, and then they ran wild in the countryside ... In the twenty-ninth year of Daoguang, soil thieves Zhong Minhe and Lik-Kei Tang gathered hundreds of people and harassed towns and villages such as Said, Anping, Zheng Ping and Duoxian. In May of the fifth year of Xianfeng, more than 10,000 bandits from the county plundered along the Fujiang River from Gan Village in Xunyang, especially Duoxian No.2 and Wubao. " Of course, if tourists are lucky enough to know nothing about this, they can also go to the tea garden of Baji Mountain Villa, 2 kilometers south of Liubao Town, or swim between the pier of the ancient tea boat road along the Liubao River and the cascade waterfalls in Shanping Village, leaving historical scars.

? Liubao Town Hekou Tea Pavilion (provided by the Propaganda Department of Cangwu County Committee)

? In contrast, the silence of the estuary pier, the old camphor tree with dead trees and green leaves, and the shiny old gourd teapot hanging on the wooden beam show the true face of Liubao Town. It's hard for tourists not to feel the guilt caused by the "tea pavilion era" that is gone forever-people really should observe and think here.

At the same time, this area is no different from Guangxin stronghold in Cangwu County, which was a shower in Lingnan after the Han Dynasty surrendered to Nanyue in Zhao Tuo. Compared with other places, mountains and rivers are connected here, the soil is fertile, the climate is particularly warm and humid, and the vegetation is lush. Terraces full of tea trees are everywhere, neatly trimmed to waist height according to unique aesthetic and economic principles. Today, Liubao Town is one of the largest tea-producing areas in southern China. Most black tea is produced in this mountain area. In addition, it also produces unique osmanthus.

1693 hand-drawn map of Cangwu County (provided by Cangwu County Archives Bureau)

? As can be seen from this hand-drawn map of Cangwu County in the thirty-second year of Qing Emperor Kangxi (AD 1693), the area where Liubao Town is located is marked as "Tea Pavilion". According to the examination, the "Tea Pavilion" is a pavilion-like building in Liubao, which is mainly used by tea merchants and farmers to buy, trade and store tea during the tea-picking season. In the map of Cangwu County attached to the Cangwu County Annals revised during the Tongzhi period, the same position was marked as "Chatingling".

? Records of shrimp fighting tea in Cangwu County Annals compiled during Tongzhi period of Qing Dynasty (provided by Cangwu County Archives Bureau)

The map attached to Cangwu County Annals compiled during Tongzhi period of Qing Dynasty is "Chating Ridge" in the northwest of the mountain center (that is, in the direction of Liubao), which also records that Liubao local Liubao tea has reached the stereotype of "mellow" tea taste.

? The above two pictures prove each other, indicating that Liubao Town was a famous tea production and marketing area in Qing Dynasty, so that "Tea Pavilion" replaced "Duoxian" and "Liubao" and became a local "geographical symbol".

? The fragrance of tea garden (Liang Guanghui/photo)

Liubao tea is mainly distributed in Zhougong, Blackstone, Luoji and other places. Because its geographical environment is dominated by hills, low mountains and Yinchuan, the cultivated land is scarce, and the soil is yellow-red soil mixed with sand shale and granite, which is very suitable for the growth of water source forests, pine trees, bamboo poles, tea leaves, laurel trees and other plants. Whenever the rainy season comes, rainwater irrigates the striking red sand shale canyons and rolling mountains here. The mountains and streams are rushing, the waterfalls are tumbling, and the mineral-rich water quality brings a unique taste to the tea here. There are tea mountains everywhere in Liubao Town, and various ancient tools related to tea can be seen everywhere. Besides visiting the traditional producing area of Liubao tea, how our ancestors who lived in this land began to grow and make Liubao tea has always attracted my curiosity.

? Ziya (provided by the Propaganda Department of Cangwu County Committee)

Hongya (provided by the Propaganda Department of Cangwu County Committee)

Although the picking and making of Liubao tea are also in accordance with the solar terms, the day of spring tea mining is not "before the Ming Dynasty" but "before the society". We followed Qinshan up the mountain to see Liubao old tea garden. Sixty years ago, the tea garden area here once reached 8000 mu, and in 2006 only 100 mu was left. It is this 100 mu old tea garden that has now become the only Liubao original seed protection park in Wuzhou. We can see many sparse tea trees along the road. Qin Shanhang brushed a bunch of tea leaves with his fingers and motioned, "Red buds are the best."

The "red bud" in Qin Shan's navigation mouth is exactly the purple bud that Lu Yu said in the Tea Classic that "purple is the top and green is the bottom".

? For a long time, Liubao tea farmers have used chessboard cluster planting to plant tea trees through direct seeding and sexual reproduction of tea fruits. They don't build terraces, and even grow cassava between young tea gardens. After hundreds of years of variety variation and differentiation, a group stock consisting of four or five small varieties has been formed. Most of these original species are green buds, but there are also a few red buds and purple buds (color and quality are different).

Purple bud tea is rich in tea polyphenols and anthocyanins, which can be transformed into more flavor and aroma substances in the process of slow fermentation, but the bitterness of anthocyanins is weakened in this long fermentation process. However, ordinary tea leaves are constantly released after such storage, and when they are really tasted, the taste is not as good as before. Purple bud tea is bitter and heavy when it is brewed, but it will become mellow and sweet after the aging process of Liubao tea. Liubao tea farmers have always been mixed with purple buds and green buds. They think that only in this way can we transform Liubao tea with good quality.

At noon, Huang, director of Cangwu County People's Congress, and secretary of Liubao Town had lunch with us. He introduced us to the tea garden in the main producing area of Liubao Town. In addition to the big tea gardens such as Shuanggui, Baji Mountain Villa, Heishiding, He Qian and Liu Si Shangqun, new tea gardens in Qin Yi, Heshun, Wang Xiu and Dazhong are gradually being built, which will surely lay a good foundation for the further development and prosperity of Liubao tea industry. Finally, he suggested that we might as well visit the tea garden in Baji Mountain Villa and enjoy the beauty of natural ecology there.

? Tea Garden of Baji Mountain Villa in Liubao Town (provided by the Propaganda Department of Cangwu County Committee)

At this time, it was raining. Accompanied by the leaders of the town government, we drove to a wilderness. Less than 2 kilometers from Liubao Town. After stopping halfway up the mountain, we began to climb all the way along the mountain road to the top of the mountain. It's raining, and the beautiful face of a small tea garden unfolds slowly like a painting axis. From the bottom of the valley to the top of the mountain, it is endless green. There is no "alopecia areata" in the tea garden here, and there is no fault where nothing grows. Looking up from afar, those scattered villages are like isolated islands, hidden in the depths of mountains.

? "This tea garden was built during the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty and is the only well-preserved century-old tea garden in Liubao Town." Zhang Qi, who accompanied us on the tour, said: "Of course, the development of tea gardens is still very tortuous!"

After the implementation of the contract responsibility system of joint production in rural areas in the 1980s, most of the primary tea-making factories that supplied raw tea to state-owned tea factories were dissolved, and the economic income of tea farmers was far less than that of octagonal and rosin, and their enthusiasm was frustrated. The more fatal blow comes from the sharp drop in the international tin price of 1985. After liberation, all Liubao tea exports lost Malaysia, the largest market, almost overnight. With the closure of China's tin mine in Malaysia, tea farmers in Liubao also cut down their tea trees ... For more than 30 years, Baji Tea Garden has been abandoned-now, the tea garden is contracted by him and another party member cadre, and they cooperate with Wuzhou Sheng Mao Tea Company to turn the abandoned tea garden into an ecological sightseeing tea garden of more than 300 mu.

"We all grow ecological tea," Yi Zhang Qi said proudly. "Tea gardens and forests are mixed together, and no pesticides or fertilizers are applied, even in new tea gardens."

The new tea garden in front of us is about ten years old, and the tea trees are obviously growing vigorously, with dense branches and leaves.

From a distance, those scattered villages are like isolated islands, hidden in the depths of mountains (photo by Mo)

The crowded and lively Liubao town is drifting away behind us. From Wu Tong to Li Chong, from Tang Ping to incorruptible, from Liu Si to Gaojian, I saw the other side of Liubao: quiet countryside, towering old trees, gurgling streams, adobe wall wooden attics and several sparse tea trees everywhere; In ancient times, docks, stone bridges, arches, tea houses, cows, birds, dogs, chickens and so on were used to transport tea. , paved a mottled pastoral scenery. Especially when we go deep into the hinterland of tea garden, this kind of scene can be seen everywhere. It reminds people of the charm and poverty of tea country, and Lu Yu, who is far away from the depths of the forest and closed to reading history and writing books. He was born in a high place, and he listened to the wind-even compensated with the essence of the trees planted by his ancestors-and the fruit stalls filled with bananas and papaya haunted people's laughter. ...

Tea picking in tea gardens (Chen Li/photo)

? At a roadside station, I drank a large cup of ancient Liubao tea from Yi family. Yi is a beautiful woman who lives in Baoping village. Before she handed me the teacup, I saw her roll a bun with a few elegant pearls on it, which looked particularly dignified and noble.