1000 yuan, yeh right
Trip Start
Apr 18, 2010
1
10
15
Trip End
Oct 13, 2010
Golmud, Qinghai, China
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Dun Huang lies on the western end of the Hexi corridor in Gansu Province. It’s was one the important and famous cities of The Silk Road, with over 4000 years of history. It is generally populated with Han Chinese.
Historical places of interest are the fabulous Mogao Caves, The Singing Sand Mountains and The Crescent Moon Springs.
The Mogao Cave Complex has over 490 caves containing the largest and second largest indoor Buddha’s in the world. It is a wonderful place to visit, although the restoration work has changed the facade of the caves. restoration work is still continuing today with donations coming from all over the world. Some of the statues which generally are honed from the rock have been damaged over the millennium. White Russians did some terrible work on statues. Man continues today to destroy what we don’t like. Remember Saddam Hussein being pulled down by the US soldiers in Iraq.
Stunning fresco’s and beside each statue of Buddha is his right and left hand men. One the younger looking is called Ananda. My brother Colin’s grandson is named Ananda and he is a smiling happy intelligent boy, takes after his Grandpa who takes after his brother.....
The Crescent Moon Springs is a hoot, you walk through the entrance and are confronted by the camels. Camels just sitting or standing waiting for people. Tourist unlike us seem to prefer iridescent orange shoes. I believe it is for hot sand walking but let me tell you it is a sight. Eight or so camels with orange shoed passengers climbing a sand dune............
Roberta, Lesley and yours truly selected a couple of strong good looking camels. Yeh I know that they don’t look good, but when you want a ride you have to say nice things or they might spit on you.
Our camel lady ( the one who will lead us) is having a yelling fight with anybody she looks at. Us excepted. She yells and has a look of distain at other handlers. Me and the girls just have to laugh.
Other things to keep us involved is a bit of sand tobogganing. Simon joined us for the hard trek up the dune for the short adrenal run down. A walk over the sand to the Crescent Moon Spring before those intrepid souls in their flying machines. (MicroLites) just had to fly............. All good.
We celebrate Ben’s birthday I was tasked with finding a cake shop. They made a cake and decorated it in thirty minutes. I think Ben enjoyed the fun. Oh I found the shop when I was looking for a dentist........... Now there is a story........
I had chipped a tooth on a nut or something.
Lilly our guide came along to make sure that the dentist did what I wanted. The dentist shop is on the main street all open so passers by can view the operation, we find the dentist asleep in the chair, she wakes, Lilly explains the problem. The lady ( a nice young women) wants to cap the tooth. I assure her a temporary filling will suffice.
The place is not the cleanest . She rubs some brown stuff over the drill then cleans that off. Drills a bit then finds a box of stuff... No cleaning this time... No suction so my mouth is filling with the debris from the drilling and my saliva. Like all dentists she speaks to me as she is drilling but it is all chinese to me............. What is with me and medical things, I should be on the toilet or in hospital by now............ But all is well.
A nice meal at the night markets. And these are really good markets. Full of new things to look at. I joined the smart ones and brought some wood carvings. .........
Kaye and I found a friendly little cafe and had a range of food. All for about four dollars including a really nice yogurt drink. The weather continues to be kind to us, we are blessed................
Back on the road and a couple of bush camps await before our next hotel stop.
Pete and Kirsten share the driving load. It is quite a load as well let me tell you.
A good road at first and we are chewing up the k’s. We have to stop on a regular basis as we are sucking in the water at a great rate. Something to do with clearing the toxins before we hit altitude. Pete assures us that if we follow his example heights of 5000m and more will be a breeze. So we drink and we pee, then we pee then we drink some more. Men to one side of Calypso and women to the other.
Pete as he is wont to do finds a mountain camping spot, oh yes we have started to climb. we leave the road cross a flowing creek set up camp in a nice little private spot with mountains as a back drop......... It starts to rain, not that heavy but cold....... a few locals arrive, all good, until one smart guy starts to demand payment of 1000yuan. Pete and our guide Lilly tell them no and to leave. He persists, the evening meal of rice and vegetables ready to eat. The smart guy gets even smarter and tries to pull down our rain awning. Pete shows his darker side and throws the guy away......
We pack up in the cold wet rain in very quick time. No way are we going to subject to intimidation from these hoods.
Packed up quick time we are back on the road. It is in a field with grass just above the ankles, tents pitched all most on top of each other, we eat and then into our now damp tents we settle for the night.......... Morning and all is good we laugh at the experience of last night, especially the look on the hoods face when Pete asserted himself.
Last night before the mystical city of Lhasa. I nice camp the local Yak herder drops by but know problems this time. Good nights sleep and we wake with a double rainbow, now tell me that that doesn’t mean something in this spiritual land.
