China. More importantly first visit to the First Lounge

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

We got up early, had breakfast

then went for a walk around the town.

As with everywhere lots of construction going on. Roads and paths were ripped up everywhere and being rebuilt. We saw an old building that was covered in blue insulation that looked a bit too much like polystyrene.

you could literally buy everything in the room. maybe it was more this is what you'll pay if you damage anything?

Straubs · Sep 23, 2018

drron said:
Really enjoying the TR.It looks like the bad was more hilarious than really bad.
Though I always take my wench with me to hotels so guess I might have problems.

Well, Im not above the odd freak-out so I would have had no hope!

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

Our itinerary for this day

After breakfast, first visit Jiayuguan Pass. It is the first pass at the west end of the Great Wall of China, six kilometres southwest of the city of Jiayuguan. Along with Juyongguan and Shanhaiguan, it is one of the main three passes along the Great Wall. The pass is trapezoid-shaped with a perimeter of 733 meters and an area of more than 33,500 square meters.

Then visit Suspension Great Wall, 11 kilometres to the downtown Jiayuguan City, the Suspension Great Wall was built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). It gets its name because there is a 231 meter long section, with an obliquity of 45 degrees, built onto a 150m high ridge. From a distance, it looks like a dragon about to extend its body towards the ground.

After lunch, visit Wei-Jin Mural Tombs - Located about 15 kilometres northeast of Jiayuguan, Wei-Jin Mural Tomb is a big tomb group with over 1,400 tombs built between the 3rd Century and 5th Century during the Wei and Jin dynasties. It is the largest subterranean art gallery in the world, containing a large number of colourful murals, attracting tourists from both home and abroad.

At the end of the tour in Jiayuguan, you are transferred to the station for your overnight train. Jiayuguang-Lanzhou by overnight train T6602 or similar train, 22:30-07:11 next day, 2 bed cabin soft sleeper

And that's what we did except we started with the mural tombs. Another super interesting day.

The drive out of city was along kilometres of roads with willow tress down the middle and either side. Sadly this is the only non-blurry picture of the spectacle.

First we visited a small museum where it was clear they hadn't seen a western visitor in a long, long time

with some very healthy apple

and date trees growing in the courtyard

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

then out to the Wei-Jin Mural Tombs themselves. In the middle of what I'd describe a gibber plain was a carpark and a small building. Around the plain are posts that indicate tombs. Only two have been fully excavated and one is open to the public. The other tomb was taken out brick by painted brick and moved to a museum in ?? Nanjing maybe.

We went down a long set of stairs and looked around the three chamber tomb. It's pretty cool that it has remained intact (supposedly). I reckon Helen had it scheduled for an hour but we were done in 10 minutes.

Replicas of some of bricks in the museum

1000+ tombs under this plain

and another brick

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

We tried, and failed to get Helen to reduce the size of the lunch order. We don't need separate veg. We don't need soup. Yep, sure...

Chinese version of Deliveroo!

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

drron said:
Really enjoying the TR.It looks like the bad was more hilarious than really bad.
Though I always take my wench with me to hotels so guess I might have problems.

We laughed so much on this trip Ron. Never with bad intent. We just found so many situations comical.

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

Jiayuguan had been pretty much completely reconstructed. It was huge and covered an amazing area. It was interesting that when we walked out the most western gate Helen said once we would have been stepping from China into the unknown world.

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

and a couple more

Looking from the outside wall towards the western gate

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

We then went to the Suspension Great Wall.To the right of the wall was a huge Chinese Army base complete with tanks doing maneuvers. No pictures

There was no way that I thought I would get to the top so Al set off and up. I plodded along behind and miraculously, after a touch of vertigo, also made it to the top.

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

We were way too early for the train, again, nothing taking as long as Helen's itinerary indicated that it should so we suggested we go back into town and visit the lake. Helen was actually happy for the suggestion.

We mosied around for ages with the main destination being a observation tower bizarrely shaped like a giant dolphin.

When it came time to get out of the park and head to... dinner... we got a little lost and ended up wandering along some off-path trails that looked suspiciously like somewhere men might wander under the cover of darkness, but of course that would never happen in China

woodyren · Sep 23, 2018

Really enjoying your TR. I fly out to Shenyang in North China tomorrow. Great to see others who enjoy (or can make do with) the local hotels, breakfasts, street food, train travel, beers (of variable temperature) etc. Have visited over ten times now and still so much to see.

Thanks.

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

Dinner was fantastic. Helen must have said to the driver that we liked market/street food so we went to the market. First the first time we sat with Helen and our driver and they selected some cracking local food - skewers - lamb, bread, chicken, beans like edamame, flat noodles, some seriously hot chilli, lots of cold beer. We shouted, it cost just about nothing and it was brilliant.

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

We were still going to be a bit early but we told Helen we might as well go to the station and we were lucky we did because when we got there Helen had lost her train ticket. She unpacked her two small bags about five million times and strangely it didn't jump out on that five millionth time.

We eventually convinced her to to the ticket office and when she came back, big smile on her face, it turned out that because all of our tickets had been bought that that office by the agency, it cost her the equivalent of about 20 cents to get the ticket re-issued.

Boarding time. Helen had looked at our tickets and after she realised we were in fancy and she was in better than steerage, she also mentioned that we were both in bottom berths. That seemed a bit strange as we knew there was a top and bottom in each cabin. So on we get and I'm in 7 (bottom bed) of one cabin and Al is in 5 (bottom bed) of the cabin next door.

The agency had booked what it thought was the right/best thing, two lower berths, without realsing they wer actually splitting us into two cabins that would get two strangers in them.

We didn't unpack while we pondered just bunking in the same cabin and the train pulled out of the station. It stopped again within five minutes and our cabin mates came onboard. Mine was on his way home to Shanghai, was more than happy to sleep next door, explained it all to the conductor and Al's cabin mate and odd situation averted.

The cabin was great, two very comfy bunks, a chair, private western toilet and a whole lot of lace!

These are Flying Asparas (sp?). They featured heavily in the show in Dunhuang and in the Buddhist religion. We'd read a review of one of the Dunhuang shows and the translation from Japanese (or what the reviewer thought they were called) was Flying Asparagus

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

Lanzhou – Xiahe

Itinerary - Arrival at Lanzhou Train Station, met by our representative in Lanzhou and transferred to a nice hotel for a buffer breakfast. Then have a short walk in the Yellow River Park. The Yellow River passes across the city centre of Lanzhou.

Then drive 75 km southwest of Lanzhou to Binglingsi Grottoes. ‘Bingling’ means ‘thousand Buddhas’ or ‘ten-thousand Buddhas’ in the Tibetan language. Also known as Bingling Temple, the grottoes are carved on Jishi Hill 75 km from Lanzhou. Bingling Temple Grottoes are famous for stone sculptures of Budda Buddhist pagodas in relief and murals of Esoteric Buddhism.

After lunch, drive from Bingling Temple to Xiahe which takes about five hours. Xiahe is well noted for its old Laprung Temple. Xiahe is densely populated by Tibetan people. Stay at Laprung Hotel.

Meal: Hotel breakfast, Chinese lunch

This was close to how the day panned out.

Helen went off in search of our driver. It turned out he was stood beside Al and me! Our third Buick G8. Such a comfy vehicle to tour in.

Instead of a buffer breakfast at a nice hotel we were taken to the best beef noodle restaurant in the city in the city where beef noodle originated. Quite a breakfast!

VPS · Sep 23, 2018

bigpetebrown said:
We then went to the Suspension Great Wall.To the right of the wall was a huge Chinese Army base complete with tanks doing maneuvers. No pictures

There was no way that I thought I would get to the top so Al set off and up. I plodded along behind and miraculously, after a touch of vertigo, also made it to the top.

View attachment 136972 View attachment 136973 View attachment 136977 View attachment 136975 View attachment 136976

Fascinating TR

What are all the tags in that photo

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

It was then an hour or so drive to a large dam that I think is damming the Yellow River. The Yellow River runs right through Lanzhou, the only city in China to straddle it.

Lanzhou also lays claim to being one of China's most polluted cities due to it's position between two ranges.

Back to the dam. A huge sea of polystyrene up against the damn wall.

There was some confusion about how we could get to Bingling Temple and Grottoes. Itinerary said drive but we could also go by boat. We though boat sounded way better and after confirmation from CIT they would pay for boat off we went.

Boat was built for people with either no legs, or very, very, skinny short ones. Just after we left the dock I was confronted by a very dead bloated body floating in the river. Everyone else either ignored it, or didn't see it.

Although details where we booked seem to say it would take over an hour to get to the temple it took about 45 minutes. Very scenic across the main lake and then even more scenic once we entered the river valley

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

Some more of the boat ride

The Bingling Temple on the cliff to the right. It's a Taoist temple. The grottoes are of course Buddhist.

We'd been told a couple of weeks before leaving that the grottoes had been closed due to flood damage. I'd seen onlline that people were reviewing them, although saying that they weren't fully open. I said to our Tour Beijing rep that if they were open we wanted to see them.

Older pictures online show a boardwalk running beside a beautiful stream through a forest of willows. This is what we saw

bPeteb · Sep 23, 2018

It was a miracle that it was open at all, or that any of the bridges had survived what was quite clearly a torrent of mud and rocks coming down the narrow valley only a couple of months before.