Look beyond the beaches of Sanya to find the world's largest Guanyin statue, erected near Nanshan, China's southernmost mountain.

The story goes that the three-sided statue faces mainland China, Taiwan and the rest of the South China Sea -- meaning that the bodhisattva blesses not only China, but the whole world. At 108 meters tall, the figure was raised and enshrined in 2005 and is one of the tallest statues on the planet.