Yunnan / Dali / Butterfly Spring

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The spring, some 30 kilometers north of Dali, draws, as many a Chinese tourist destination, its rating as an attraction not just from its physical features but also from a particular legend associated with it. In the case of the Butterfly Spring, the Chinese believe that once a pair of young lovers committed suicide by jumping into the water, in order to escape a cruel king. However, the two didn't die but were transformed into two of those butterflies that favor the spot. Alas, for the butterflies, one has to come in late spring or early summer.