Moustache - STALIN HAD ONE BUT THEN SO DID GANDHI.

The rain had stopped and a light mist hung over the sky for our drive from Bishkek to Arslanbob. It then lifted and rising up before us was the snow capped Fergana Range.

We drove through the Otmek and Ala-Bel Passes, both over 3,000m high. As we descended we negotiated our way through more herds of animals coming down to the winter pastures in the valley below.

It was a long day in the car as it’s over 600km from Bishkek to Arslanbob, where we were having a home stay with a local family.

We passed the giant Toktogal Reservoir on the way. This is a huge source of hydro power for Kyrgyzstan, yet with the dryer seasons the reservoir is low and it’s not producing the electricity it once did.

Arslanbob is home to the world’s largest walnut grove, producing over 1500 tonnes of walnuts per year. The harvest happens in mid-September and the entire township is involved.

These are naturally occurring forests that were supposedly known during the time of Alexander the Great. The walnut is sometimes known as the ‘Greek Nut’ after Alexander. It’s believed that he exported the Arslanbob nuts to Greece after his Central Asian campaigns.

In more recent times walnuts from this region were Kyrgyzstan’s first export to Europe.

The country and the people seem to be poorer than in the north with fewer cars and more donkeys.

Our home stay was in a small property in the middle of a walnut forest. The nuts were everywhere, lying on the floor drying or piled high in containers. They are such an important part of the local economy, that when the children go out to play in the forest, they are expected to gather nuts.

The next day, before we started our drive from Arslanbob to Osh we visited the Long and Twin Water Falls.

The trip to the Long Water Fall involved a 15 minute drive in yet another Lada Niva. This was a little hairier than our first Lada experience and involved some real off-road driving. We then had a 45 minute climb up a steep shaley slope. This water fall has an impressive drop of 80m however the best views were looking back down the valley to Arslanbob.

The Twin Water Fall has a drop of 23m and is easily accessible from the township, without the need of a rattly Lada and driver.

The drive to Osh was a much shorter road trip, of under 200km, compared to the previous day and a lot easier on our backs and bums over the bumpy roads.

In Kyrgyzstan most vehicles are second hand and brought in from Japan, Korea or Europe. They come in left or right hand drive – either is acceptable.

The vehicles are usually between three and nine years old. This way they avoid the excessive new vehicle tax and still have a good life ahead of them.

There are many varieties of vehicles imported, from budget to luxury. Each town seems to have a predominance of a few particular brands.

Osh had Hummers and the humble Woo (Daewoo). The Woo is even the car of choice for the Osh taxi fleet. Which is not that practical when you have two sacks of potatoes, a box of tomatoes, 20 litres of water and your wife to transport home from the market.

Seat belts are compulsory, but only in the front seat. As these are mainly late model vehicles, they are fitted with both front and rear seat belts. However for some reason the rear belts are tucked away out of site, unable to be used. I questioned Vitalli about this and he insisted that he didn’t have any, despite the fact that his were clearly visible.

One was actually holding the spare tyre in place.

On the way to Osh we stopped at the Uzgen Archaeological and Architectural Complex. The minaret and mausoleum waere built between the tenth and eleventh centuries. The mausoleum was built in three stages which is evident by the three distinctive sections of the building.

Osh is one of the oldest cities in Central Asia, with a history dating back over 3,000 years.

It’s situated in the Ferghana Valley, that spans both Kyrgyzstan and neighbouring Uzbekistan.

In the 8th century it rose to prominence as a silk production centre along the Silk Road.

There has been much civil unrest in the region between ethic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks. First in 1990 and more recently in 2010.

Our morning tour of Osh took in Sulaiman-Too or Solomon’s Throne, a rocky outcrop that rises up abruptly behind the city. It’s of great significance to Muslims as the Prophet Mohammed is believed to have prayed there.

Built into the mountain side is the Cave Museum. The exhibits aren’t remarkable but the museum is certainly unique. The whole area has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Within the rocks around Solomon’s Throne are many small spiritual areas that, used correctly, will cure ailments, give long life and even make women fertile.

After lunch we went to Osh Market (Not to be mistaken with the Osh Bazaar we had visited in Bishkek) where the usual array of fruit and veg were on display. Again all the clothes and souvenirs were made in China.

The drive from Osh to Kozhokelen was an interesting one.

Firstly I had the feeling that our driver and guide had no idea where we were going, secondly, neither did we.

We later discovered that this was their first trip to the Pamir Alay Mountains and we were in the vanguard of travellers to this region.

We finally arrived at our home stay after nearly three hours of driving, much of it making good use of the Nissan Pathfinder’s 4X4 capabilities.

Vitali then decided that we needed to make a ‘beer run’ so that took another 50 minutes, retracing our steps back down the mountain to another village.

This really was a home stay, as the family had moved into another area of the house and we had the prized room next to the oven. This was fine with us as the temperature had plummeted.

Naturally the loo was outside and, for obvious reasons, a distance from the house.

It was definitely going to be a one loo stop night.

Home stays are a way that the locals can make few extra Som on the side, as these frontier destinations have little tourist infrastructure, such as guest houses or hotels.

The next morning we were off for a 6km trek to ‘The Waterfall’, stopping along the way to see The Blue Grotto. This cave had become a shrine, in honour of a local Muslim, who was said to have had magical powers. Hanging near the cave was the head of an Ibex or ‘Marco Polo’ as they are known, also dedicated to this gifted local.

The weather was cold and damp but the views were spectacular.

As we descended it actually started to snow. I was very glad that I had packed my woollen beanie and gloves.

Shipping containers seem to get a second, or even a third life in Kyrgyzstan, as they are used in many different ways. They are the main storage area in the markets and on building sites. I have even seen them integrated into buildings and also pulled apart and used as fencing.

The people, culture and landscape of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are very different, however through their common ties with Russia they are also similar.

Our next stop is Uzbekistan so it will be interesting to see the Soviet legacy there.

We arrived into Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, in the evening and our guide, Asel, suggested a place to eat not far from the hotel. It was a huge restaurant with a vibrant noisy atmosphere. A replay of the AFL Grand Final was in progress on a large plasma screen in the corner. I don’t think that the locals were all that interested

I must admit, neither were we.

Kyrgyzstan is much poorer than neighboring Kazakhstan. The big difference is that it doesn’t have oil. There is still a huge Russian influence and like most post Soviet era countries, any industry left with the Russians. Soviet made goods have been replaced by those from China – they are cheaper and not surprisingly, better quality.

The condition of the roads are the most obvious example of the lack of public money.

Kyrgyzstan has certainly suffered by the vacuum that was left after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

They are on to their third president since independence in 1990. The first two were thrown out of office, and the country, by popular uprisings. They ruled for themselves and not the people.

The architecture has a very Russian influence. This is understandable considering the Kyrgyz were originally nomads and the yurt was their only dwelling.

Vitali, our driver, was Russian speaking but unlike most Russians, he had a good sense of humour. He was a Major in the Russian Army but has now taken a pension. Asel was from the mountains and a native Kyrgystany. Together they made a great team, which was fortunate as they were with us for our entire time in Kyrgyzstan.

On the morning of our first full day we visited Osh Bazaar. This is the largest market in Bishkek and covers an enormous area with a huge variety of goods.

The meat section contains a bespoke sausage maker. Here the customer can have there own selection of horse meat cuts stuffed into horse intestines. Horse is a delicacy in Kyrgyzstan and sells at a premium.

In the afternoon we visited the National Historical Museum, where two of the three floors are devoted to the glory of Lennin and Marx. There are many heroic sculptures and ceiling murals featuring Russian achievements. However the third floor does have some reasonably good Kyrgyzstan nomadic relics.

The museum was built in 1984 and has a strange Russian Art Deco, come Modernist Style to its design.

The way this museum has been designed and decorated is its own exhibit.

We then drove to Ala-Archa Gorge and back, unfortunately it was shrouded in fog. This did give a rather surreal quality to the snaps.

The fog turned to rain and we scampered off the mountain but not before getting rather soaked.

Here we met a Spaniard who was riding his pushbike from Asia to Spain.

On our third day we drove from Bishkek to Cholpon-Ata. We had Kazakhstan on our left and the snow capped peaks of Küngey Alta-Too Range on our right.

Kyrgyzstan is still a rural country and we were constantly being stopped by roaming herds of sheep, goats, horses and cows that were blocking the road. They were being moved from their summer pastures in the mountains to the winter ones in the valley.

We also stopped to get a bucket of strawberries from a roadside vendor – the last of the summer fruit.

The village people of Kyrgyzstan still live by the traditional ways and arranged marriages are common. There are still cases of bride kidnappings and our guide Asel, a village girl herself, said she only visited her parents occasionally when she was at university as she was of kidnapping age.

On the way to Cholpon-Ata we had a side-trip to the ruins of the Minaret, Mosque and Mausoleum of the Balasaygn City centre. This was originally built in the the eleventh and twelfth centuries. All that remains is Burana Tower, this was rebuilt in the 1950s by the Russians. At the same site there are headstones from the six century depicting distinguished looking gentlemen holding a cup of wine. Plus a few petroglyphs featuring Ibex, the region’s wild goat.

We stopped off for lunch at a local café and had some of the strawberries.

Cholpon-Ata sits on the northern side Issyk-Kul, the world’s second largest alpine lake. Because it’s salty it never freezes.

For two months in summer it’s a popular resort spot for Russians, Kazakhs and the local Kyrgyz.

Apparently during the high season it’s packed with sun seekers, when we arrived it was eerily quiet.

North of the town, in a field of glacial boulders, we saw more Petroglyphs, these were more substantial than what we had seen earlier. Most were from the 8th century BC to the 1st century AD. The site was unfortunately marred by tagging.

Getting there was interesting as we drove up the old airport runway.

Late in the afternoon, as the sun was getting low we visited the very strange Cultural Centre or Rukh Ordo. This is defined as a museum and contains five identical buildings, that represent the world’s major religions. On their spires are the symbols of Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and two forms of Christianity – Roman and Orthodox.

The next morning we had an interesting discussion on the Ukraine over breakfast.

This was initiated by Asel, not by us.

With so much Russian history, culture and influence in the area it’s not surprising that their point of view is decidedly pro Russian.

But then we are influenced by Western ideologies and that’s where our opinions are formed. Being able to see both sides offers an insight into how we are all being manipulated.

Power and influence is the driving force behind these conflicts and that applies to the way both Putin and Obama formulate their propaganda.

After healthy portions of sausages, eggs, more strawberries and politics for breakfast we were on the road again.

The rain had returned for our drive to Grigorevskoe Gorge and there was no chance of getting a better view of Lake Issyk-Kul.

It was the same with the gorge, which was disappointing. It was a rugged mountainous pass, with a fast flowing river. Which would have been very picturesque, given better weather.

Almaty in Kazakhstan was a sudden change from what we were used to, after the behemoth that is China.

We were suddenly in a far more European influenced society, with a greater mix of Caucasian faces. There were sidewalk cafés, far fewer people and polite drivers, who weren’t constantly honking their horns. And in regard to road rules, the humble pedestrian wasn’t at the bottom of the food chain.

The alphabet was Cyrillic and there was a mixture of right and left hand drive vehicles – yet they drive on the right.

Even the beds were softer than in China, which in some cases had been like sleeping on the kitchen table.

Taxis seem to be few and far between resulting in many people, both old and young, hitch hiking.

The word Almaty means apple – the name comes from the very large apples that once grew in the Tian Shan Mountains that dominates the city skyline.

Getting our visas for Turkmenistan was a high priority, and an interesting experience. Our guide, Marina, filled out the forms, they were submitted, corrected and then we were sent off to the bank to pay US$110 for the visas.

Then it was back to the consulate to submit the forms with a bank receipt.

The next day we returned to collect our visas and were given a lecture about the do’s and don’ts of travelling in Turkmenistan.

This was going to be a challenging country.

Touring around Almaty with our guide Marina and George her father, who was also our driver, was more like taking a city tour with friends.

Firstly we went to the the Ascension or Zenkov Cathedral where there was a service being held in remembrance of the Cossacks. There were young and old men in Russian uniforms and those ridiculously large hats that I remember from old cold war movies.

Zenkov Cathedral, completed in 1907, is Russian Orthodox and adorned with onion domes in cream and white. It’s made of timber and reportedly the third largest wooden structure in the world. The leader being the Forté residential block in Melbourne’s Docklands.

Then for a complete contrast we visited the Almaty Central Mosque that was build in the Turkish style in 1999. With over 70% of Kazakhs being Muslim this mosque is large, impressive and very busy, especially on Fridays.

After we visited the major sites Marina took us to the urban areas and we popped into a local market, supermarket and a department store. Here she chatted about life and living in Almaty. Then we went into the burbs to see where the affluent residents of Almaty live.

I wanted a carabina to hold extra equipment on my camera bag and George, who was the ‘outdoors’ type knew exactly where to go.

Our last stop was a walk up to the TV tower, overlooking the city. It was a balmy afternoon and some exercise was welcome. It was also a great opportunity to view Almaty from a high vantage point.

The area around the TV tower contained a mini zoo, an amusement park and spectacular views of the city and the surrounding mountain peaks.

Sadly our time in Kazakhstan was too short as we were only there for two nights.

The road trip from Almaty to Bishkek, in Kyrgyzstan, was made in a Soviet era Lada Niva. It was pouring with rain and I was wishing that we were still in George’s Toyota 4WD.

Valentino, our driver for the trip to the Kyrgyzstan border, took us through some of the villages that were originally on the ancient Silk Road. These caravans could only travel about thirty kilometers per day, which was the distance between the villages. As each village was built on a river, water and provisions were readily available.

It was then onto the highway and across the steppe with the Tien Shan Mountains on our left.

In Turpan there are two time zones. Beijing time, for the tourists, trains and hotels. Then there’s local time, which is two hours behind Beijing time, and for everyone else. And because of the heat, there is also siesta time.

Turpan is in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous region and covers an area of 1.66 million square kilometers.  It’s also the second lowest spot on earth, next to the Dead Sea. There is a big Muslim influence and many of the road signs and shop fronts are in both Chinese and Sanskrit.

Being an oasis town it was also a major stopping point along the Northern Silk Road.

We arrived at the Turpan rail station at 6:30am where we were met by our guide Xaia, pronounced Shi, and were then driven 40km to Turpan city and our hotel. After a shower and a rest, we started the day’s activities.

First was Flaming Mountain, which gets its name from the red colour of the stone.

This is a very apt name, especially under the searing heat of the summer sun, when temperatures an reach into the high forties.

Next was the Bezeklik or Thousand Buddha Caves. These are the poor cousin of the Mogao Caves we had just visited at Jiayuguan. The caves had been both pillaged and desecrated by Europeans and the locals Muslims.

The German Albert Von Le Coq (1860-1930) repatriated many of the sculptures and painting to Berlin. He carved and hacked away over 360 kilograms of artifacts, wall-carvings, and precious icons. A lot of these artifacts were subsequently destroyed during WW2.

Next was a visit to Grape Valley, just 10 kilometers east of Turpan. It’s an 8km by 2km stretch of fertile land sandwiched between the Bogda Mountain on the north and Kurultag Mountain on the south.

Grapes and mulberries have been growing here for more than 2000 years. There is reportedly over a hundred varieties of grapes grown in this area. However only 10% is used for wine, the rest is eaten fresh or dried.

The vines grow almost horizontally on the trellises and ripen in the shade, rather than in the scorching  sun.

Drying houses cover the hillsides as dried grapes get a much higher price than fresh. A farmer may only get 5 Yuen for 1kg of fresh grapes, however 1kg of quality dried fruit could fetch him up to 100 Yuen.

The temperature was hotting up and Xaia suggested we had a break and resume our site seeing at 5pm, when the weather was cooler.

When I read in our itinerary that we were going to see an irrigation facility I thought that it would be some high-tech engineering extravaganza.

This was far from the truth.

The Karez or wells is an ancient irrigation scheme, started during the Han Dynasty (206BC – 220AD)

There are over 1,100 Karez covering 5500 km in the Turpan Drepressio, the longest is 50km while the shortest is 5km.

A Karez is created by digging wells down to the water table, near a village. This might initially be 2m deep, then more wells are dug at 10m intervals, always down to the water. Then the vertical shafts are joined by a horizontal tunnel at the water table. This tunnel is usually only 1.2m high.

This process continues until the water source is located.

All the work was done by hand and many lives were lost due to tunnel collapses or drowning, when the water level suddenly surged.

The last Karez was dug in 1973, after that the water ran out.

There is oil in the Turpan region and much of the ground water has been contaminated due to constant drilling and subsequent oil seepage.

The water is used for drinking and irrigation, with many of the vineyards being supplied by water from the Karez.

In the middle of October they bury all the vines in clay. This is to prevent them dying off in the winter, when the temperature drops down to minus 15 degrees over night.

Turpan is an area of extremes.

The Ancient City of Jaime, 10 kilometers west of Turpan, was a Buddhist city of 7,000 inhabitants. It was built over 2,400 years ago, then destroyed by the Muslims in the fourteenth century.

Built on an elevated island, with a river on either side, it was a natural fortification, measuring 1,700m by 300m.

As with many ancient fort cities the farmers would leave the city, to work the fields during the day, then return to safety of the fort at night.

Because of the intense heat in Turpan there was only one storey built above ground and two below.

There are temples, lookout towers, administration buildings, houses for the common people and a palace for the king.

It took over three hours to drive to Urumqi, then on to The Grand Canyon of Nanshan, our first stop on day two.

This is obviously a popular spot for wedding snaps as there were at least a dozen bridal groups being photographed.

There was a couple that seemed to be without a photographer and I was asked to take their photo.

The Grand Canyon of Nanshan is in fact a reservoir created by damming a mountain river. There were stunning mountain views from some angles, that’s if you avoided the walkways and obligatory tourist glitz.

This is a racially mixed area with a large population of Uyghur, a Muslim minority in China.

There have been some tensions between the Uyghur and the Chinese authorities recently and we were stopped on four occasions at police checkpoints.

We then drove back to Urumqi and spent an hour in the Grand Bazaar.

The Bazaar is not that grand, despite the fact it’s the largest bazaar in the world. It’s more like a huge department store with individual store holders selling a range of tourist style souvenirs. The place was rather quiet, so I guess the locals agree.

Urumqi, like Turpan is part of China’s western development plan.

In order to relieve the overcrowding in Eastern and Southern China the government is trying to entice people to move west. There are acres and acres of new apartment blocks being built in expectation of the exodus from the east. Road and rail links are also being built with a new Bullet train from Xi’an to Urumqi, due to be completed next year.

A year too late for my liking as the Bullet trains are a far better option than the overnight rattlers we had been on recently.

We had an evening off and decided to walk around the city. On our wanders we discovered a rather bohemian cafe that served cold beer and good pizza. We were a bit over rice, noodles and strange cuts of meat by this stage. There was a rather unusual sign, hanging out the front, that seemed to be making light of the authoritarian rule.

I hope that the officials are more open minded in the west.

Urumqi was our last stop in China and the weather had really warmed up. Despite that we were told to bring warm clothes for our trip to Heavenly Lake.

Many tourist attractions in China are run by private companies and you are compelled to use their transport and facilities.

Heavenly Lake was no exception.

The private companies have a monopoly and you pay every step of the way. We paid to park the car then paid to see the lake. The entry fee was 100 Yuen, 90 Yuen of that goes towards the 56km, round trip on the shuttle bus.

Private vehicles are prohibited for day trippers.

Politics aside, it’s a beautiful natural lake surrounded by soaring, snow capped, mountain peaks.

We arrived into Jiayuguan on the overnight train from Lanzhou, after another sleep deprived night.

We had been put on the slow train that stopped at every station. We later discovered that there was a train that left half an hour later than ours and arrived two and a half hours earlier.

Vickie, our guide, was there to meet us and after another quick breakfast of beef and noodles we were back into the site seeing.

Our first stop was the Jiayuguan Pass, or Fort, and the Great Wall Museum.

The weather was warmer and the tourists fewer.

There was a choice as to how you could see the fort, one was by ultralight – we chose to walk.

The fort is located at the western end of the Great Wall and is historically one of the main passes through the wall. It was built during the early Ming dynasty, sometime around the year 1372.

This part of Western China is in the Gobi Desert and has been designated as an expansion area. Soil has been moved here in order to grow trees along the roadsides. The water comes from natural springs that have their origins in the nearby mountain range of Qing.

For millennia Chinese dynasties have been trying to tame this harsh environment. When this particular part of the Great Wall was constructed soldier/farmers were brought here both to defend the frontier and feed the growing population.

With the protection that the Great Wall offered, the Silk Road expanded and the area around Jiayuguan became a melting pot of multiculturalism.

Not only goods were traded but so were ideas.

From the fort it was a short drive to the Overhanging Great Wall. This is another part of the wall that has been renovated and gives you a good idea just what an enormous feat of construction the Great Wall was.

As we discovered in the museum, there is more than one wall that makes up the Great Wall complex. Successive Chinese dynasties have added to it according to their defensive needs.

The Great Wall, stretching from Dunhuang in the west to beyond Beijing in the east, was built over thousands of years and is estimated to have been 21,196 km in length. Considering that the circumference of the equator is 40,075 km, it really is great.

In the afternoon we made the long drive to Dunhuang and really got a feeling for the surrounding desert environment. There were patches of fertile farmland interspersed amongst a flat barren landscape. Ever present were the high tension power lines stretching as far as we could see.

We also passed two of the largest wind farms I have ever seen. There weren’t hundreds of turbines, there were thousands.

The Chinese don’t do anything on a small scale. Even the toilet block at one of the motorway rest stations had more urinals and cubicles than you would find on the entire Hume Highway.

Strangely the car park was empty so I guess they are looking to the future.

Dunhuang is an oasis in the Gobi Desert producing fruit, vegetables and grapes. Like the rest of China, it’s a work in progress, with cranes dominating the skyline and construction at every turn.

The next morning we were off to the Dunhuang Yardang National Geopark, which is about 180km from Dunhuang.

The rock formations in the park were formed by water and wind erosion over a 700,000 year period. This is the largest park of its kind in China.

The temperature was warm but the air was still hazy, a byproduct of China’s industrialisation, even this far west.

We them went to another outcrop of the Great Wall. This one was made of straw and mud, yet was still standing after 2,000 years.

The day was to be spent driving around the Gobi Desert and, as we discovered from Vicky, there are many colours of the Gobi. These depend on the makeup of the soil, there’s black, white, yellow and red. And when it rains and the grass grows, there’s even a Green Gobi, however this doesn’t happen very often, as the average rainfall is only 24mm.

A visit to Yumen Pass and Yangguan Pass completed a long, warm and dusty day in the desert.

Both these passes were important gateways on the Silk Road, joining Central Asia with China.

Day three started with a visit to the Mogoa Caves, made a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987. Before we went to the actual caves we had an introduction in the ‘Digital Caves’. This was a high-tech, audio video explanation of the cave’s origins.

There were two video presentations, one explaining the geological origins of the caves and the other showing the caves in detail. The last video was in a 360 degree theatre with high resolution graphics that recreated some of the main imagery contained within the caves.

The Mogoa Caves are also known as the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas and contain 492 temples carved out of the sides of a steep river bank.

It has documented over a thousand years of Buddhist history in art, painting and sculpture.

Situated close to Dunhuang, the Mogoa Caves were of religious and cultural significance to the Silk Road travellers. They were abandoned in the eleventh century, a result of the spring feeding the river drying up.

In 1907 a Hungarian-British archeologist, Sir Marc Aurel Stein, discovered the ‘Library Cave’. This cave contained a wealth of religious and historical documents.

In the tradition of archeologists before him, he cheated the locals and plundered the treasure.

More treasure hunters came from France, Russia, the US and Japan. Resulting in most of the library now being held in foreign capitals.

Our last stop for the afternoon was the Singing Sand Mountains and Crescent Spring.

Here giant sand dunes dwarf the natural crescent shaped oasis. There is a pagoda next to the spring that was built in the 1990s. It replaced an old Buddhist temple that was destroyed by the Red Guard during the Cultural Revolution.

The facilities at all of the tourist sites we have visited have been amazing. They aren’t there for Westerners but for the Chinese, who are avid travellers.

Another long day was coming to an end, so it was back into the van for a two hour bumpy ride to Liuyuan to catch an overnight train to Turpan.

Our travelling companions on this trip were Alfred and Annamaria from Switzerland.

Alfred, discovering we were Australian and believed that sharing a cold beer wouldn’t be out of the question.

We did manage to convince the catering staff to sell us two cans of local ale, unfortunately they were warm.

Warm beer seems to be the norm as we moved west in China.

We took the overnight train from Xi’an to Lanzhou. This is a city with a history dating back 2,000 years and was a major stopping point on the Silk Road.

We arrived in Lanzhou at 6.30am and were met by Adreana. After a quick breakfast of beef, noodles and vegetables, we set off to see the sites of the city.

We were meant to do this on our second day in Lanzhou however the road rules had changed and our driver, having a vehicle with even number plates, wasn’t permitted into the city area on the day we arrived.

This is a very small city, by Chinese standards, only having 3.4 million people, yet there is enough congestion to warrant a subway system. It’s construction was now causing more disruption hence the banning of vehicles from the CBD on certain days.

Our first stop was to visit the White Pagoda Mountain.

After crossing over the Lanzhou Iron Bridge we had a steep climb up the mountain to the pagoda. Unfortunately the pagoda was being renovated, as Lanzhou was the host city for the forthcoming Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festivals, so its famed ‘whiteness’ was in no shape to be photographed.

The views of the Yellow River from the top were worth the climb – a climb that was welcome exercise after a night confined to the train.

The Yellow River is indeed yellow, well a clay colored muddy yellow. It is regarded by many Chinese as the ‘Mother River’ because its yellow colour matches their skin.

On a siding next to the river, and harnessing its power, are the Lanzhou Water Wheels. These are two giant timber wheels that currently divert water to a mill-house, via an elevated aqueduct. They were originally used to irrigate farmland in the area. The waterwheel was originally invented by Duan Xu in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

Until 1952 about 252 waterwheels stood along the Yellow River at Lanzhou.

Adjacent to the waterwheels were a group of river rafts, that use inflated sheep skins as the means of flotation. They are a popular attraction with the Chinese during the tourist season.

There was even an onsite puncture repair centre.

The Mother Statue of the Yellow River, constructed in 1986, was just down the road. It was over run by Chinese tourists having their photo taken in front of it.

The statue is of a mother and baby. It’s believed that the baby’s gender is hidden, so the viewer can chose what sex they want it to be, when they make a wish for the good fortune of their own children.

It was then into the car and off for a four hour drive to Xiahe. This drive would normally take a lot less time but it was raining, slowing the traffic down considerably.

Xiahe County is in the Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture and is part of what was formally known as Tibet, but is now well and truly in China.

After arriving in Xiahe and checking into our hotel we were off to meet a Tibetan family on the Sangke Grassland.

These semi nomadic Tibetan herdsmen have three locations to graze their cattle and move from place to place, according to the seasons.

It was the beginning of autumn and most of the herd had already moved to the winter grasslands.

The next morning we visited the Labrang Monastery. This is a huge complex with over 1,000 monks living and learning there. It’s not only a monastery but a university that has a number of faculties including medicine, philosophy and of course Buddhism.

Apparently there are over 108 monasteries in Tibet, Labrang being the largest. From the amount of cash, received from offerings, I saw the monks counting, it may well be Tibet’s primary industry.

It was interesting to note that most of the Tibetans use iPhones and not the more common Chinese Android devices. This is because Apple have cleverly included Tibetan in their language selection.

Something the Chinese refuse to do.

In the afternoon we had a long walk around Xiahe and another great coffee at Cafe Norden. The coffee was an unexpected highlight, given where we were.

Tibet, like most of China, is modernising and new buildings are popping up at a rapid rate. The small town of Xiahe was no exception, with indoor shopping malls being built adjacent to the main street. From what I could see these were very underused, with most shopkeepers preferring to remain on the main thoroughfare.

It was then back into the car for another long, wet drive back to Lanzhou.

When we arrived the traffic was chaotic. Again it was the turn of vehicles with even number plates and our driver only had permission to drop us off at the railway station for our trip to Jiayuguan.

I would hate to imagine what it would be like with both odds and evens on the road.

Our introduction to Xi’an, the start of the famed Silk Road was summed up by this quote from our guide Maggie.

“To see tens of years of history visit Shanghai. To see hundreds of years of history visit Beijing. To see thousands of years of history visit Xi’an.” 

Naturally our first stop in Xi’an was the Terracotta Warriors.

Over 7,000 have been unearthed in the area around Emperor Qin Shihuang’s tomb. It is believed that here are many more still buried there.

They were discovered by a local farmer, Mr Yen, in 1974. Since that time he has gone on to become a celebrity. He even has his own store at the site, where he signs books, postcards or whatever else you might care to buy.

Even taking a snap of Mr Yen will cost you.

The bodies of the warriors were made in casts while the hands and heads were crafted individually, making each solder unique.

Emperor Qin Shihuang had a vision for China and fulfilled it in a brutal and bloody manner. He united the Chinese, through a series of wars lasting 16 years. He wasn’t all bad as he introduced a unified system of weights and measures plus a common currency.

The Emperor, like so many ancient and modern leaders, wanted his power to last forever. To this end he built his tomb on such a grand scale that he included an army to help him keep his power in the afterlife.

The Terracotta Warriors are that army.

The average size of a flesh and blood warrior in those days was 1.5m, his warriors were made to be 2m tall. Emperor Qin Shihuang wanted to make sure he would never be beaten, living or dead.

In the afternoon we hired bikes for a ride around the 14.5 km of the ancient city wall.  It was very flat but with the cobblestones, a bit like the Paris to Roubaix.

At Maggie’s insistence we bought an evening entertainment package that consisted of a dumpling dinner and cultural show.

The dumplings were shaped according to what was inside. We had piglets, fish, lotus flowers and tomatoes. There were some with no real shape, so I was a bit sceptical about their filling.

My favourite act of the cultural show was a percussion group, playing a variety of drums, cymbals and bells.

The next day we visited the Big Wild Goose Pagoda and the Shannxi History Museum. The Big Wild Goose Pagoda is made from stone and was originally constructed in 652, during the Tang Dynasty. Today it has a very distinctive lean that was caused by an earthquake in 1556.

The Shannxi History Museum, like all Chinese tourist attractions, was crowded. Here the locals were taking snaps of everything in museums – what do they do with all those photos?

We wanted to get a shot to celebrate the start of our Silk Road adventure, so after much searching Maggie and the driver found the the Silk Road Monument that Thea discovered existed just outside the city walls. It was a large sandstone sculpture depicting a camel train, heading west, just like us.

In the afternoon of our second day we visited Muslim Street and the Great Mosque of Xian.

Muslim Street, as the name suggested is the area where most of Xi’an’s Muslim community live. It’s a very crowded street full of food, goods of all variety and souvenirs for the tourists.

There were dozens of food stalls and fast service restaurants.

We had a quick meal in one of them before heading off to catch the train to Lanzhou.

I ordered food from the front counter and the service was so fast that the food was already on the table by the time I got back to my seat.

Within the Muslim Street precinct is the Great Mosque, which bares little resemblance to other mosques we have visited. It’s designed totally in a Chinese style with pagodas, gates, relief sculpture and calligraphy. Representational art is rare in Arabic mosques, with the only decoration consisting of quotes from the Koran.

The overnight train to Lanzhou was an experience.

We had a ‘soft sleeper’ which was a cabin with four bunks, which we shared with a Chinese couple.

The bed was comfortable enough however the train ride was full of bumps, rattles, jerks and frequent stopping. I have know idea how many carriages were hitched and unhitched during the night.

Music and a constant babble in Chinese was piped into our cabin until 11pm and then resumed again at 5.30am.

Beijing is China’s capital and after Shanghai, the second largest city in China. It’s also regarded as the political, educational and cultural centre.

From what we have seen the Chinese love to be tourists in their own country, Beijing was no different.

Our guide in Beijing was Lucy and as she explained, a member of the Han community.

There are 56 different cultural groups in China with the Han making up 90%. The other 55 ethnic groups make up the remaining 10%.

I think that all the ethic groups love to travel as we found a huge diversity in the tourist mix.

We arrived late on a Sunday and the air was clear and the sky blue. The next day the haze was back but not as thick as we had seen.

Our first stop was the Temple of Heaven, one of Beijing’s largest temples and situated in a huge parkland area, not far from our hotel.

Here the local retirees do their morning exercises. This can vary from line dancing to hackie sack kicking with a variety of other activities in between. There is also mahjong and cards for the less active.

People are in groups or for the more solitary souls off on their own amongst the trees.

Many of these trees are very old, some dating back 400 years. We knew this by the plaques indicating their age.

The temple complex was constructed from 1406 to 1420 during the reign of the Yongle Emperor, who was also responsible for the construction of the Forbidden City.

This is where the Emperor came every year to pray for good weather and an abundant harvest.

Between visiting the Temple of Heaven and Tiananman Square we had tea, tasting five different varieties. According to our hostess every one of them had some amazing power to heal and revitalise the body.

Our next stop was the famous Tiananman Square, a vast open space dominated by public buildings on on either side, with Mao’s Mausoleum in the centre and the Forbidden City at one end.

This is a place that many Chinese wait their whole life to see and there were a lot fulfilling their dreams on the day we were there.

Other cities in China have a Forbidden City but the one in Beijing is far and away the largest and most impressive.

With 980 buildings covering 72 hectares, this is a vast complex, so it’s no wonder that it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.

Built from 1406 to 1420 it was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming dynasty unti the end of the Qing dynasty. Built at the same time as the Temple of Heaven it has been the home of emperors and the centre of Chinese government for almost 500 years.

In the evening we visited the  Beijing Chaoyang Theatre, Acrobatics World. The theatre wasn’t full so our tickets were upgraded to VIP class. This gave us softer seats in the middle rows, close to the action.

Acrobatics have been a part of Chinese cultural life for over a thousand years, however this show was totally modern.

It was themed in an typical Chinese manner with umbrellas, pushbikes, hats and motorbikes. The motorbike act started with one bike speeding around inside a metal sphere, and ended with eight of them. At times it seemed totally chaotic, much like the Beijing traffic.

It was a relatively early start on day two and the haze was back. The temperature had also dropped a degree or two, which made climbing the Great Wall much more bearable.

On the way to the wall we had two obligatory factory visits, complete with shopping opportunities. One was to a jade workshop and the other an outlet that purported to make cloisonné (wire and enamel ware). It was really a front for a vast showroom.

We yet again resisted the urge to buy and moved on.

Once we reached the Badaling section of the Great Wall, at Lucy’s suggestion, we chose to walk on the south side. It was less crowded and more strenuous, but certainly worth the effort as we also got great views looking back to the north side. There were thousands clambering over the wall – the tourist invasion of 2014.

Not long into our walk the sky’s cleared and the sun made an appearance, improving the clarity of the snaps.

Forty two kilometers from the Beijing CBD, in the Changping District, is the Thirteen Tombs of the Ming Dynasty.

This area was also constructed by the Ming Dynasty emperor, Yongle (1402 – 1424). Based on the principles of feng shui, he chose to build his own mausoleum here.

Leading up to this necropolis is the sacred Road or ‘Spirit Way’ with statues of guardian animals and officials on either side, lining the way. The animals are all in pairs, with one pair sitting and the other standing.

We reached the Mausoleum of Emperor Chengdu late in the afternoon and the sun was low in the sky – the magic hour for photography.

The first hour of our last morning in Beijing was spent investigating if the Chinese Post Office could send my useless Sony lenses home.

It tuned out to be too hard to arrange as there was too much danger of them being broken. Not that they were of any value now.

We were then loaded onto a rickshaw for a ride through an old area of Beijing. These old areas are known as hutongs and are a tangle of narrow streets clogged with people and vehicles.

We then visited a ‘typical’ house of a hutong resident where the owner explained the way they live in this area. I have a feeling that this was more for show than authenticity. Still it was interesting to see how people live in the more traditional areas.

We had a separate guide for this trip into the hutong and Tony peddled along beside our rickshaw, narrating as we zigzagged in and out of the traffic.

Our last stop, before boarding the Bullet Train to Xian, was a quick visit to the Summer Palace.

This vast area, dominated by an artificial lake, was the summer resort of The ‘Dragon Lady’ Empress Dowager, Cixi. She diverted a fortune in silver, designated for the navy, to build this personal retreat.

Immediately we arrived in Shanghai we went to a Sony service centre. They believed it was the camera at fault but there wasn’t enough time to have it repaired. So it was then off to the Sony Store to see what replacements were available.

After two hours of trying different camera and lens combinations, testing my old lenses with demonstration cameras, and managing to break many of them, we decided to buy a new camera and telephoto lens.

We were only two weeks into our trip and the idea on not having a good camera was unimaginable.

It still wasn’t that straight forward as the store didn’t have the lens in stock, that had to come from the warehouse and in order to get a discount I had to buy the lens first, then the camera. We appreciated the chance to save a few Yen as the price of camera equipment in China is about 20% more than what you can buy online or in the States.

I had to wait a couple of days to get the new camera and lens so we were immediately back into the sightseeing.

The Bund was top of the agenda on our first morning.

This is a great introduction to Shanghai, as it highlights the paradoxes that make up this huge city of over 24 million people.

This is the city where east meets west and the Bund is a showcase for the city’s diversity of style and culture. This riverfront area runs along the Huangpu River facing the Pudong. On the Bund side are many old commercial buildings and banks that were built during the early part of last century. These overlook the Pudong, one of the newest areas in Shanghai, dominated by steel, glass  and neon monoliths.

From the Bund we went to Yu Garden, an excellent model of Chinese garden architecture. Built during the reign of Ming Emperor Jaijing in 1559 as a private garden for Pan Yuncuan, an administration commissioner.

The Jiangnan Silk Workshop was yet another ‘opportunity to buy’ we resisted and moved on to the Oriental Pearl Tower and History Museum. This is the Shanghai TV Tower and offers great views of the Bund from the Pudong area. There is a rather strange museum under the building that gives a censored history of Shanghai. This includes models of old motor vehicles, once seen in Shanghai, that have clearly been copied from the originals and scaled down.

In the evening of our first night we took the Metro back down to the Bund and wandered around.

All the old buildings are illuminated, as are the skyscrapers in the Pudong, over the river. In the Bund there is a statue of a bull, no bear, that illustrates the Shanghaise and also the Chinese positive approach to business.

With the entire population of Australia living in the city, you get the feeling that your are not alone.

The Chinese have a  rather wonderful, self deprecating, humour when it comes to naming city sites. For instance the  clock on the customs house is called Big Chin (short for Chinglish or Chinese/English).

The rain put a dampener on activities for our second day and we were forced to pull out our umbrellas. The same ultra light umbrellas that were our souvenir of Japan.

We visited the Jade Buddha Temple, Xintiandi (also known as the French Concession Area), Nanjing Road and the Tianzifang arts and crafts area. All under the protection of our umbrellas.

The Jade Buddha Temple was founded in 1882 and, not surprisingly, contains two Buddhas carved from jade. These were made in Burma and then sent by sea to Shanghai.

The French Concession area is another link with Shanghai’s western past. The area was a foreign concession from 1849 to 1946 and still retains much of its original charm. There are a large number of European style residences as well as some excellent restaurants.

We returned that night to try one out.

On our last day we made the ninety minute car transfer to Suzhou. This is the city where Marco Polo arrived and not surprisingly named it the Venice of the East. Suzhou is in the Yangtze Delta and on the shores of lake Tai with many canals, stone bridges and beautiful gardens.

It’s a magnet for tourists, home to 11 million Chinese, the richest city in China and one of the fastest growing in the world.

The Grand Canal is the longest canal in the world, with the oldest parts dating back to the 5th century BC.

The Humble Administrator’s Garden is one of the main attractions and regarded by many as one of the finest gardens in China. It, along with other classical gardens in Suzhou, are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

We also visited the Suzhou Museum, a contemporary building designed by the Chinese-American architect Leoh Ming Pei and completed in 2006. It houses a huge collection of ancient paintings, calligraphy, ceramics and crafts.

We finished our trip to Suzhou with a Grand Canal boat trip, complete with a serenade from the boatman.

Another nod to Venice.