Zigong's wooden salt derricks still stand, and the sheds below them still boil

Most travellers pass Zigong (自贡) on the way to somewhere else in Sichuan, which is roughly how a city that drilled the deepest wells on earth two centuries ago managed to stay quiet. It is about an hour from Chengdu by high-speed rail, and almost nobody gets off.

The derricks that were never taken down

The wooden towers are called tianche (天车), and they were raised to lift brine out of the ground on ropes turned by water buffalo. Thousands once stood over the city; a dozen or so still do, lashed from fir poles and bamboo rope, leaning over car parks and noodle shops with no signage to explain themselves.

The one worth walking to is at Shenhai Well (燊海井), drilled in 1835 to a little over a thousand metres — the first well anywhere to reach that depth. It still works. Natural gas from the shaft feeds shallow iron pans in a low shed, and someone rakes the crystals to the rim while you stand there in the steam. The ticket is small and the smell of woodsmoke and hot brine stays in your jacket for a day.

Where the salt money went

Xiqin Guildhall (西秦会馆) was built between 1736 and 1752 by merchants from Shaanxi who came for the brine and never left. It houses the salt history museum now, and the roofline alone justifies an hour: carved opera scenes stacked four tiers deep, painted and repainted, with almost nobody underneath them on a weekday morning.

Tea on the Fuxi

Down at the water, the Wangyemiao (王爷庙) sits on the bank of the Fuxi River with tea tables set under its eaves. Jasmine in a lidded cup, topped up from a long-spouted kettle, costs less than a coffee and buys the whole afternoon. Card games start around two and nobody moves you along.

自贡人把井架叫“天车”，如今只剩下十几座还站着。

Eleven kilometres upriver, Xianshi (仙市古镇) was the town where salt was loaded onto boats: four streets, a handful of temple halls, and teahouses that still open onto the landing. Eat lengchi tu (冷吃兔), the cold-eaten rabbit that tastes of chilli oil and patience, and huobianzi beef (火边子牛肉), air-dried and sliced thin enough to read a newspaper through.