China's otherworldly mountains that inspired Avatar

Zhangjiajie, China's first national park, also features glass-bottomed bridges, a mountain elevator and a food court complete with a McDonald's for those inclined to take it easy.

Shy was not an impatient person, but even she struggled to keep her cool when I whipped out my phone to take what must have been the 100th photo of the same view. Shy – short for Shen Hong Yan – was my guide through Zhangjiajie National Forest Park in central China, and she knew there were better viewpoints up ahead. But I couldn't bring myself to move on just yet; the soaring sandstone quartz pillars of this forest were unlike anything I had seen anywhere else in the world.

Located in the north-western corner of Hunan province, Zhangjiajie is China's first national park, established in 1982. This forest is part of the larger Wulingyuan Scenic Area that was included in Unesco's list of World Heritage sites in 1992 and later given Global Geopark status in 2001. The name may be a tongue-twister, but there is an easier way to remember it – as the inspiration for the Hallelujah Mountains that featured in the blockbuster movie Avatar. In fact, before I visited Zhangjiajie, that was the only fact I knew about this place. Shy confirmed what I had suspected: that Zhangjiajie used to be an underexplored destination even among Chinese tourists before the movie catapulted it into their consciousness.

The film franchise's official website says: "The Hallelujah Mountains are comprised of mountains floating in the air above Pandora." And while the ones I was gaping at didn't exactly levitate, the way they rose up from the ground through a wispy blanket of cloud and fog gave them an otherworldly feel. Hence the reluctance to tear myself away.

But Shy was right, and the scenery did get increasingly spectacular as we hiked on. When we reached the rockstar attraction – the solitary quartzite-sandstone pillar that the local tourism department has labelled "Praise the Lord Mountain" (a loose translation of Hallelujah) – she was practically jumping up and down with excitement. "This is what everyone comes for," she said, explaining the crowds clustered around this viewpoint trying to capture the imposing majesty of this natural spectacle on their tiny phone screens.