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“Turpan, a fertile oasis along the northern route of the Silk Road…”sounds like a good start and after all Xinjiang is about contrasts so after the snow capped mountains of the Urumuqi Southern Pastures, lots of sun, desert as far as you can see and ancients cities ruins were exactly what we needed!
About 3 hours drive from Urumuqi Santunbei bus station (150KM SE), Turpan is a medium size city, full of energy, where donkey karts, motorbikes, minivans and cars are sharing the busy streets, locals sell all sorts of nan (local bread) & skewers of lamb/ mutton marinated in s spice mix (yami!!) and the desert is right outside the city… Ancient city of JiaoHe, One of the world's architectural wonders
Dropt our bag and went straight for the ancient city of Jiao He, a unique site with more than
2300 years of history miraculously preserved thanks to the arid climate of Turpan.
We arrived there around 7PM as most tourists were leaving the site, and were simply breathless when after 15mn we realized how big the site was…it was simply phenomenal with
well preserved ruins of residences and temples all made from earth stretching as far as our sight could allow us to see, add to it that we had mostly the entire site for ourselves…MAGICAL!
Walking around the contrast of the blue sky over those bright sand ruins is stunning, and as we went further the sun started to go down, giving us as a gift an
amazing sunset over the ruins . Nearly 10PM and time to head back to Turpan, for some local style food at the market before getting some rest…after all, we were still in the snow covered grassland in the morning and just finished walking through thousands years old ruins while getting sun burned in the process!
Flaming mountain, THE hottest place in China…
About 10km from Turpan, the flaming mountain although quite touristic was going to be the perfect place to start an action packed day!
But before that, the usual ‘how to get there’ gave some hints on how the remaining part of this trip was going to be…First, two tentatives with taxi drivers who had absolutely no clue where we wanted to head to (didn’t speak a word of Chinese…) followed by a more successful
Local Uighurs
Along the waymini van sharing with locals heading to the outskirts of Turpan…so here we go, two foreigners and 6 local guys ‘moustachu’ as Chanh would say (the French speaking would understand) finally heading outside of Turpan…ok, got stopped by the police on the way (guess the blond hair didn’t help..) but were finally dropt right by the entrance…pffff…
Nothing truly breathtaking (was expecting bright red mountains but seems that the 35+ degrees were not enough to make the red color stand…), basically a
sandy valley and barren mountain, but the trip there was fun! After the horseback riding, the
“camelback riding” ! A bit of climbing up to flaming mountain and although it was morning time, started to understand why this place is famous for being the warmest one in China! Actually,
seems that during summer the place reaches the 57 degrees…. As we made our way back to the starting point, we couldn’t help but notice the motor hand glider and although it was clearly a tourist thing,
we were both looking at this tiny hand glider taking off, flying over the flaming mountain and surroundings and coming back as it took off, full speed! Mmm…guess, it
A zen moment! ;-)
Heavenly Lake (Tian Chi) didn’t take too long for both of us to decide to give it a try!
The view from the hand glider and the occasional up and down added some spices to this new experience, although not as good as sky diving (the best so far) or paragliding but you only live once so better be fun!
Tried to convince the guy to drop us by Gaochang but didn’t seem very convinced, so time to find an alternative way to reach our next destination!
After the motor hand glider the motorbike! Ready for an insider tour!
So here we were… by the side of the road, trying to get some motorbike for the remaining part of the day
Once off the main road, you don’t get to see much cars and the 35 degrees + just make the minivan unbearable so the motorbike is THE perfect way to go from one site to the other.
Perseverance is often rewarded and indeed less than 15mn after we stood by the road, one of the flaming mountain employee walked by and although he seemed surprised when we told him what we were looking for, he was
And on a motorbike we went
Simply stunning....Driving toward Baizeklik caves.... prompt to reply that he might be able to help and indeed, within few minutes he was coming back, his friend having accepted to land his motorbike! Perfect! Ok, handed up to all fit on one motorbike but after so many years in Asia nothing really surprising there!
As we were leaving the main express road and driving through
SanBao village, a lovely town with lots of trees, mud house with beautiful painted wooden doors and well…lots of mosque, each of them more delicate than the previous one, we couldn’t help but notice how happy our new friend seemed to be! As a matter of fact, looks like he was truly enjoying to take us around his town, smiling and saying hello along the way (looks like he knew more or less everyone…)
Offered us to stop by one of the local restaurant he knew for some lunch (so captivated by what was happening around us that we nearly forgot about lunch…)
Owners were quite surprised when they saw the three of us arrive on a motorbike, speak Chinese to order food & chit chat with the other guests & as we would notice all along the way,
were very friendly and avid to talk a bit more.
Some more lamb/mutton skewers to start but not without having Chanh going for a “cooking” lesson from the cook himself….hahaha, well, funny enough when you look at the picture, between the Uyghur with light color hair/ eyes on the left side, the central Asian Turkish origin cook and Chanh, not too sure who look the most Asian!
Second stop of the day, Gaochang, an ancient oasis city located within the desolated Gobi desert.
As we entered the site, donkey carts were ready to take the visitors to the inner city across the outer city ruins, but we decided to go on foot against the advices of the local guides. At first, we thought it was because they were not making money on it but quickly realized that
the 3km + on the dusty & sandy gravel road under a burning sun were well…long! Welcome to the Gobi desert!
The site in itself (inner city) is quite small with only a few ruins really worth seeing and within half an hour we had finished the visit. On the way back...well, opted for the donkey kart alternative transportation
mode! Lots of fun and
still cannot believe that a donkey can gallop so fast! (was only the two of us + the driver and a local kid and decided to go full speed, overtaking all the other karts along the way…)
Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves: an adventure just to reach the site!
Still on the motorbike, and ready for another 15+km, and although our guide had warned us that the road there was uphill and not so fun,
we truly realized how bad the road was when we reached the mountain and started to drive uphill… as our guide would say, “ Ji bai dou nian de chen “ (hundred years old dust)mmm… well, guess by the time we finally managed to reach the other side of the mountain, we were more and more having a skin color closer from the ruins/desert than the pink/red of the sun burn….but it was just so worth it! Back on a proper road and
the scenery was simply astonishing, lush green valley surrounded by pink mountains and huge curvy sand dunes! Couldn’t help but keep taking pictures as we were driving toward the cave, enjoying the ride, and
Eheh
The Thousand Buddha Caves of Baizeklik so glad we kept this site on our list despite our guide advice (mostly because of the road condition)
The caves’ murals in themselves unfortunately are in a pretty bad shape and give a pretty weak idea of the past glory, most murals being damaged or simply gone… One of the cave though still have a
ceiling entirely covered with hundred of Buddha and where figures of Indians, Persians and Europeans still appear in the paintings. The site in itself although it takes less than half an hour to go through is superb, the
rock cut caves truly stand out & the view over the valley and the surrounding pink color mountains is breathtaking.
Time to head back to Turpan and say good bye to our “guide” who dropped us by a local bus stop, this outing in the desert has been magic and after all those emotions we are ready to head to our next stop… Tian Chi (Heavenly Lake)!
Time to go back to deep green forest and crystal clear lake!
As we went up using the cable car, we both start to feel like we had teleported ourselves and where somewhere in the middle of the Alps! Still astonished by how fast you can go from one type of landscape/climate to another in Xinjiang!
The lake is located about 100km+ north of Urumuqi and although very touristic it was the perfect gateway before going to the airport in the evening.
Nice fresh air, lots of trees and snow capped mountains all around! The way back to Urumuqi airport has been well, interesting! Second bus left 15mn before the scheduled time so we had to jump into another one, ended up using one of the non official taxi in Urumuqi (no other choice) who had a car problem 500 meters from the airport (still think that he simulated that one so that not to get caught by the police at the airport entrance…) but still managed to make it back on time for Chanh to catch her flight to Shanghai and me to head to Kasghar….pffff….
Next: Kashgar, the gate to Central Asia! Vibrant & colourful! Trip around Xinjiang PART 1: Xinjiang Southern Pastures: Kazakh, horses, snow & yurts!
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Where do you get your energy from, Laetitia. You seem to have and endless supply of it. :)