China 2 - Xinjiang 2 -Highway, Sand, Wind...

 

In the middle of the night we have to take down our tent. If you don’t know yet how we got here, read our last blog article. Everything we don’t grab or fix somehow, gets blown away. The heavy things simply roll in the direction of the wind, the light ones fly away. So we pack up everything inside the tent and immediately attach it to the bikes. The most exciting task is to pack the tent, it blows like a sail. 12 arms would have been great, but somehow we manage with four. What now? More or less sheltered we lay down next to a little pump house. Every gust throws new sand onto us. We do not think we will find sleep.

 

 

At some point we must have fallen asleep, because when we wake up, it takes a while to realize where we are – and why. Unfortunately the wind did not calm down, at least we find the bags we lost the night before. We try to cycle – the side wind gusts seem to play with us. Every truck that overtakes us creates pulls us towards the road, just to blow us away again. We have to slow down every time, otherwise we would drive into a ditch or into the car lanes, to relax a bit we push the bikes. Soon we realize: This way we will need the whole day for the remaining 25 km to Turpan – and our full strength. That’s way we decide to hitchhike – we read before this is impossible in China, and with our fully loaded bicycles… But we are lucky, some pickup cars pass by and already the second car stops!

The next shock doesn’t wait long: A police check point after ca. 10 km! Usually we spend a lot more time there than the local people. So we grab our passports, get off the car and line up in the queue between all the Chinese. The inspector seems to surprised to react and we pass in less than one minute: Personal record and the same speed as everyone! Puuuuh!

 

 

While driving the car shakes in the wind, but when we arrive in Turpan it is completely calm. Surprised we watch the people walking relaxed along the roads – and we try to get rid of all the sand, shake it of our cloth and hair and empty sand of our shoes. The sun heats and cheers us up. The hostel is built exactly for our needs and Turpan has lots of sights. The oasis is famous for its grapes and raisins. Such water consuming plants in the middle of the desert? One of the largest channel systems of the world has been constructed: the “Karez”. Some thousand kilometers of channels take the water to the fields, big parts of it is underground. Impressive, such as the museum that has been built to illustrate the effort.

 



But not only humans created places worth a visit, nature helped as well, for example the flaming mountains and the 1000 Buddha caves. We quickly realize one thing: The Chinese know how to deal and make money out of tourism. Everything is organized very efficient for big masses, and you can spend money for knick-knack everywhere. When we leave Turpan we pass by a giant thermometer, which is located at the supposedly hottest point of China. Huge amounts of busses stop here, to let the curious tourists out. The experience to get off an air conditioned bus and feel the heat of the desert for sure is more impressive than when having cycled here the whole day. So we decide to save the entrance fee. One Chinese guy who is about to leave the area affirms our decision: Seeing us turn round makes him laughs out loud, says we did exactly the right thing and that the thermometer is not very big and definitely not worth 20 yuan.

 

 

Off we go towards Gobi desert. Here often our thoughts jump back in time and we imagine how ages ago the camel caravans travelled these huge distances. We have to fight rough conditions, but we have a paved road, lots of signs to show us the directions and the possibility to hitch a ride on a truck anytime.

 

 

We spot windmills at the horizon. A lot of windmills. It doesn’t take long to understand why China’s largest wind power plant is located here. The reason: A storm every day, very reliable! Again the gusts blow us from left to right and right to left, we try to avoid the ditch and the car lanes, early in the afternoon we are exhausted enough to call it a day. We don’t even bother to pitch our tent, instead we build a wall with all our carriers, in the lee under a bridge. The wind brings additional sand… So we crowl into our sleeping bags, the sand is drumming on them, making sounds like rain. Oh, no it starts to rain and we have to move to a more wind exposed place. Usually it never rains here, unfortunately the one exception occurs when we could not use our tent…

 

 

New day, new luck. In the morning sun everything dries quickly. We try to use every second without wind and the rare tailwind to cycle. The road leads straight through a boring landscape. We are cycling on highway G30, as there does not exist a real alternative for the next 1000 km. Crashbarriers on both sides, barbwire. In the middle: Many trucks, cars and two cyclists.

 

 

The only highlights are the highway services, which are 50 to 100 km apart from each other. Here we always get to fill our water bottles, but food and most important enjoy a hot, spicey meal. The police check points almost disappeared, there is not too much to control here anyway. Our next destination is Hami, here we treat ourselves with 2 nights in a hotel, of course this means a daily police registration.

 


 

Nevertheless we enjoy the Chinese everyday live, the crouds, market places, the delicious food and a lot of culture. Now we have only 200 km left to go until we leave Xinjiang province. We count every kilometer as we already look forward to a China without all the surveillance and police inflation. After 1800 km in Xinjiang we pass the last check point.

 

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