Blogs from Gansu, China, Asia - page 9

Bonjour à tous! Comme vous pourrez le constater, j’ai écrit un (trop) long email en anglais donc je vais essayer de faire plus court en français. Je suppose que vous avez bien d’autres choses à faire que de lire mes péripéties sur les routes de campagne de Chine et puis, de mon coté à Pékin le temps est super ensoleillé et j’aimerais bien en profiter au plus vite ! Je suis rentré il y a 2 jours de cela sur Pékin pour 2 raisons : revoir Becky avant de traverser le corridor de Hexi dans le Gansu, long de 1000km, et également récupérer mes sacoches vélo qui sont enfin prêtes ! Je devrais passer une petite semaine ici. J’ai laissé mon vélo dans la province du Gansu et je suis rentré en train (17 heures de ... read more

For the past four months, we've been living at the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, a small city located at the edge of the Gobi and Taklamakan deserts in Northwest China. The Grottoes were first carved around the 4th century CE, purportedly by the Buddhist monk Yuezun, who saw a vision of a thousand buddhas at a cliffside near the oasis in Dunhuang. For over 1,000 years, Buddhists, powerful local rulers, and wealthy patrons carved out and decorated nearly 500 different caves into the cliffside at Mogao. This ended around the 14th century, likely due to foreign armies encroaching into the area. In 1900 an Hungarian-born "archaeologist" discovered a hidden library at Mogao, which contained thousands of ancient texts and manuscripts, including the earliest printed book in history, the Diamond Sutra. Danny has been teaching English to ... read more

26 March 2012 Tuesday. As breakfast wasn’t served until 7 am we decided to take the 8:30 bus to Xiahe (the other departure times are 7:30 am, 2 and 3 pm; cost: 76.5 RMB). Even then due to the time it took to check out and deposit some bags with the hotel for our return, and then the taxi ride to the South Bus Station, we didn't get there until 8:30. We easily found the place that sold tickets and upon loading our luggage and climbing aboard they immediately departed…another close call as the next direct bus wasn’t until 2 pm. The bus was very nice, and for entertainment we were treated to the Chinese version of “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles;” but in this case there were a few additional forms of transportation…hay wagons, boats, etc. ... read more

Dunhuang for me was the part of the trip I was looking most forward to, we just had to get there. I was only around 5hours by train from Jiayuguan but the train times were all really stupid times. In the end our train was supposed to depart around 5am infact it was delayed and departed just before 7 and even then became further delayed so we eventually arrived around noon. Then according to all the information that I could find we wanted to head for Charlie’s café which was apparently across the street from the bus station. Unfortunately the bus station moved 3years ago and the café is no longer opposite it. So after we took a taxi to the bus station we then found out from two German guys that we had to walk ... read more

Life in Baiyin is fantastic! Its been an amazing first month. Just after my last blog Carole arrived, my new flatmate and school buddie. And she's awesome! Been invited out for dinner and lunches calmed down a little, although we still have been invited to some delicious meals both at people's houses and restaurants. Karakoe has become a weekly part of our lifes, Ben and Myself were invited along with Ben's landlord and friends to KTV for an evening of singing and eating, we enjoyed it so much we took Carole and Bob there a few nights later. They have a choice of English songs and for where we are it is a pretty good selection, and it makes a great night out rather than just sitting and talking to eachother. With there only been four ... read more