A Week in Xinjiang Province

I caught a flight from Lhasa to Urumqi and arrived in the evening.

The next morning, I tried to go to the Xinjiang museum, but it was closed for May Day. I ended up going to the bazaar, meeting a really cool Chinese woman, and spending the whole afternoon eating Uyghur baked goods and hanging out in a cafe. I really needed the rest and it was such a lovely afternoon.

The next day, we headed to Turpan. We got there in the evening and had a lovely dinner. When we got out of dinner, there was a sandstorm going on and there were intense winds all evening, meaning we had to spend the night in our room

The next day we started our explorations of Turpan. We planned a relaxed day of walking around and checking out a bookstore, bazaar, and museum.

I particularly enjoyed this walkway, which was covered in grape vines.

I also found these bags of rose buds and petals for tea in the bazaar. Nothing else we saw was that noteable. It was very calm and nice to walk around the town, though.

The next day, we got a driver and made our own itinerary to see all the sights we were interested in around Turpan. We also picked up a Welsh guy, who was our travel buddy for the day.

The first place we went was to the Bezeklik, which are a series of a hundred or so caves that used to be covered in Buddhist paintings and sculptures. There’s not much there anymore, because they were mostly destroyed, defaced, and looted when the local population converted to Islam in the 14th century.

Right across the road are these giant sand dunes. We walked up to the top of one and it really felt like we were in the desert (because we were).

We then headed to Tuyugou village. It’s got a few religious sites, which aren’t really open to foreigners. We got to walk around the little streets and fields of grapes, which was absolutely stunning. We had a light lunch and tea, before walking back to the car.

Next we went to the ruins of the ancient city of Gaochang. We were too cheap to pay for the golf cart that drives people around, so we walked 5km around in the desert in the early afternoon, which was pretty intense. There wasn’t much information on the ruins, but it was cool to walk around.

Lastly, we went to the Karez museum. I would advise that no one go there. The museum was an absolute waste of money. There’s no real karez there and it’s very cheaply done. Most of the place is a gift shop. The real karez is about 3km down the road. I would recommend trying to find that.

We then all went to get dinner at the same place as the night before (and the same place we got dinner every night in Turpan). Then we hung out in the courtyard until we went to bed.

The next day, we headed to the Sugong Tower. It’s a religious site that also had very little information and was pretty restricted for visitors. I also wouldn’t really recommend going here. It was pretty boring and it felt like a waste of money.

We ended up hitching a ride with a Uyghur guy and his girlfriend into town, then got a taxi out to the ruins of Xiahe ancient city.

These ruins are incredible. The city was carved into this giant piece of leaf-shaped rock, which is surrounded on either side by valleys with rivers running through them. It’s just a really incredible place. Much more visually interesting than Gaochang, but still just as little information.

That evening, we had a barbecue in the hostel. It was really nice! We had great food and got to hang out with everyone staying at the hostel.

The next morning, we went back to Urumqi. We didn’t do much – just hung out and met travelers also passing through. This was the end of our really lovely trip. I can’t wait to go back to Xinjiang. There are so many places I want to see. I really only scraped the surface.

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