On China's Mt. Huashan, there is a passage that is probably the scariest pathway ever constructed by human beings. It begins as an incredibly steep climb called “The Heavenly Stairs”... and turns increasingly frightening as you progress onward and upward.
A photo journal entitled Teahouse at the Southern Peak documents a traveler's journey up the mountain, which becomes gradually more precarious until they encounter this narrow row of planks, held up by chains and metal stakes driven into the mountainside...
...and finally just a series of toe-holes carved into the rock.
So what exactly lies at the peak – over seven thousand feet up– that makes so many visitors risk death to reach it? This:
One of five such temples on Mt. Huashan's five peaks, this temple and teahouse was built by Taoist monks so that the structures, when viewed from on high, would form the shape of a five-petal flower.
Visit Teahouse at the Southern Peak for more beautiful (and terrifying) images.