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| DESERTS, WEEGERS AND FAT-TAILED SHEEP |
| Train travel along the Silk Road is excellent. Hard sleepers have rows of three bunks without partitions. Soft sleepers have only two bunks per row and are partitioned. Very comfy. Etiquette is well established and only the normal snoring and farting breach the peace. Most locals even respect the unwritten no smoking rules and stand between the carraiges to get their nicotine hit. When we arrived at TURPAN in the middle of the night, a sleepy tourist guide was there to meet us and shepherd us into our hotel. In Australia hotels don't let you into your room before noon - even if the room is empty. The best way I've found of overcoming this stupidity is to lie down in front of the reception desk and pretend to go to sleep. Most times the hotel management find somewhere for you to sleep - often the room that was until a few moments ago 'not ready for occupation'. In China it appears that no such silly policy applies - no matter what time you arrive, they'll find a bed for you. |
| The Turpan market was the only place where the realities of life intruded - a couple of our group members had stuff stolen. Worst was a digital camera with about 500 images on the disk. A good reason for using smaller disks and changing them regularly. If your camera is stolen you can replace it - if you lose your images there's nothing you can do. One of the best things about group travel is the tour-leader-led group meals. Because groups are visiting the same places all the time they ferret out the best places to eat. While we were in Turpan Rosemary celebrated her birthday and we were lucky enough to partake of a magnificent spread in the muslim restaurant attached to the Turpan hotel. After the meal we were entertained by an ethnic dance group - much more rendolant of cossacks than Han. I wasn't feeling 100% so chose not to go on the tour looking at the 2000-year-old tunnels that carry the snowmelt from the mountains to irrigate the grapes and melons that make the region famous. It's unlikely any of the reds of the region will win a Jimmy Watson in the foreseeable future.. |
| From Turpan we caught the first of what was to become interminable bus rides to Urumqi. The bus dropped us off at the main square that included the International bazar and, wonder of wonders, a Carrefour supermarket. As an indication of how quickly China is becoming globalised, the French supermarket giant has installed a shop that wouldn't be out of place in a large regional shopping centre in Australia. It's amazing to walk down aisles full of goods that consumers the world over would recognise - and in the same order you'd find in France or Spain. Amazing when you consider ten years ago the citizens of Urumqi probably didn't know what a supermarket was let alone seen anything like a Carrefour. After stocking up on beer and pastries (yes they had sort-of-French pastries too) we headed of into the mountains to spend a couple of days in a yurt at Heavenly Lake. Another example of the adoption of technology was the enormous wind farms seemingly out in the middle of nowhere. When the tour leader wanted to check on accomodation bookings she simply dialled up Beijing and spoke on her mobile phone. Anywhere in China - the whole country is covered by mobile phone transceivers. While at home, if I travel 30 km south of Darwin I can't use my mobile phone until I reach Katherine, 300 km away - oh the joys of living in a technologically advanced country with a soon to be privatised monopoly telecommunications provider. |
| While we stayed at the yert our host thoughtfully arranged to cook a lamb for us. Unfortunately Mr Rachit's idea of a spit-roasted lamb isn't the same as ours and we were served chunks of meat interspersed with the 'best bits' - the half cooked fat from the tail. Having visitors to their yurts is becoming big business for the Kazakhs that have herded sheep in this region for eons. Mr Rachit is mentioned in both Lonely Planet and Rough Guide - expect his prices to become unaffordable in the near future. |
| Two long days in a sub standard bus took the shine off what had been up until then an above average tour. Intrepid have decided that they'll include a crossing of the Taklimakan desert and take the much less used southern route of the Silk Road through Minfeng and Hotan to Kashgar. In my opinion they would be much better to use the overnight train from Urumqi to Kashgar. Nonetheless the desert highlighted the fact that China is still a place where no one seems to question how many man hours it takes to complete a project. The road across the desert is important because there is a huge oil and gas installation in the middle of it. To stop the sand blowing across the road they have decided to grow bushes in the sand either side of the road. So, for about 50 m both sides of the road they have installed 15 dripper lines FOR 450 KILOMETERS. Just imagine the manhours. The whole system is powered by little blue huts every 10km or so that houses a couple of people and a deisel powered pump. |
| Originally the Southern Silk road split off from the Northern route near Dunhuang skirted the southern rim of the desert before rejoining at Kashgar. In modern times the route fell into obscurity, lacking any major city and connected by poor roads. Of the two branches, however, this route is actually the older and historically more important of the two - most of the famous travellers used it, including the Chinese Buddhist pilgrims Fa Xian and Xuanzang as well as Marco Polo and in the 1930's Peter Fleming (who plundered the caves at Mogao). The ancient settlements along the way are oases in the desert, kept alive by streams flowing down from the snowy peaks of the Kunlun Shan which constitue the outer rim of the Tibetan plateau. The people in this area are more Central Asian than Chinese - they are mostly muslim (although it's not hard to find a beer - pork's definitely out of the question) and all the donkeys reminded us of Turkey and the middle east. |
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| Kashgar markets are world famous - still not corrupted by the tourists; but it won't be long. The Silk Road is the new black in travel destinations and everyone ends up in Kashgar on Sunday. |
| The camels are all gone; most of the animals at the market are fat tailed sheep and some really good looking cows. On the streets in Kashgar itself, near the mosque and the old town there are groups of men all dealing in the latest craze - mobile phones. It's said that China has 11% of all world's mobile phones and rising. That's right. One in 9 of every mobile phone on earth is owned by a Chinese. When you see the hundreds for sale every day on the streets of Kashgar you can believe it. To see some more photos....... From Kashgar we flew via Urumchi to Beiging and so completed our tour of fabulous Silk Road. |
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| The journey continues ... |
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| Hotel Turpan interior |