Tibetannet

Tang Cong drove nine hours to reach Jiuzhaigou county in the Aba Tibetan and Qiang autonomous prefecture, Sichuan province, on Monday.

The young resident of Guang'an city in Sichuan and his wife came specially to visit Jiuzhaigou which fully opened for the first time after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the area on Aug 8, 2017.

Jiuzhaigou, a scenic area on the UNESCO World Heritage list, fully reopened on Tuesday after sustaining serious damage caused by the earthquake. This was announced by Peng Qinghua, Party chief of the Sichuan provincial committee of the Communist Party of China, during the 7th China (Sichuan) International Tourism Investment Conference on Tuesday.

Jiuzhaigou was closed temporarily following the earthquake which killed 25 people and injured 493.

In the aftermath of the quake, the Nuorilang Waterfall collapsed.

Standing 24.5 meters tall, it is China's widest waterfall at 270 meters width and has been chosen by netizens as one of the country's most spectacular natural sights.

After two years of reconstruction, 85 percent of the scenic areas of Jiuzhaigou was reopened in 2019, with entrance ticket costing 169 yuan ($26), down from its normal price of 220 yuan, said Yang Fuying, head of the marketing division of the Jiuzhaigou Scenic Area Administration.

After its full reopening, the 169-yuan entrance fee would remain for some time, she said.

There was a big crowd of visitors when the sights fully reopened on Tuesday. After viewing the landmark sights, many visitors felt Jiuzhaigou looked as beautiful as ever.

"The Nuorilang Waterfall and the Sparkling Lake look the same," said Hong Shuang, a middle-aged visitor from Chengdu, capital of Sichuan.

At an elevation of 2,211 meters, the Sparkling Lake, which is 294 meters long, 232 meters wide and 16 meters deep, is so named because the sunlight shining obliquely on the lake surface gives it a sparkling quality.

The quake in 2017 caused the embankment of the lake to collapse, forming a 40-meter-long, 12-meter-wide and 15-meter-deep breach. The landscape disappeared and more than 100 cracks developed.

Through scientific research, the embankment and cracks were repaired, secondary disasters were prevented and the lake landscape was restored using ecological materials such as glutinous rice mortar instead of cement, said Xiao Weiyang, a senior engineer with the Jiuzhaigou Scenic Area Administration.

Jiuzhaigou, which literally means "nine-settlement valley", is named after the nine Tibetan settlements in the mountain valley in Aba on the eastern edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Visitors are drawn to its 108 transparent Alpine lakes and Tibetan and Qiang culture.

Jiuzhaigou is one of five sites in Sichuan on the UNESCO World Heritage list. The others are Huanglong in Aba, which is known for its karst formations and colored ponds; Mount Emei in the city of Emeishan, which is one of China's four sacred Buddhist mountains; the Leshan Grand Buddha in the city of Leshan, which is the world's largest sitting Buddha; and the habitat of the giant panda.