Travellers on the Silk Road, Towns in the Desert, (12th - Sept)

From ancient times and even to this day, the towns that we drove through, that lay along the waterless northern edge of desert, owe (part of) their existence to an amazing ancient feat of engineering. Roughly 2000 years ago (during the Han Dynasty) the inhabitants built rainwater/snow reservoirs in the mountains. They then managed to dig underground drains/canals that carried the melted water over a distance of 1000km. Every 20 meters along the Karez you’ll see what looks like a huge termite mound popping out of the desert. These mounds enabled them to dig downwards to build the canal initially and then joined the underground sections of the Karez together. Later, these mounds acted as a way of gathering the gravity fed water along its length. Amazingly, this underground system quenched the thirst of many merchants travelling along the Silk Road and allowed the inhabitants to grow large quantities of crops in the desert!

In this day and age of technology and sustainable projects, this ancient idea that still sustains thousands of lives and livelihoods, is hard to beat. What’s more, this system makes a mockery of the soviet built canals in Central Asia, where thousands of liters of water either soak into the desert or evaporate under the hot sun – and are bleeding the Aral Sea dry.


During our aforementioned first day of driving 650km (the equivalent distance of driving from London to Edinburgh) in China, we finally had arrived at 2am in the town of Kuqa. On the second day of driving we aimed to cover the same distance before arriving in a town called Turpan. En route evidence of the Karez came out of nowhere as we drove along the edge of the desert (Tarim Basin). At one point we thought we had just witnessed a biblical occurrence as we passed sections that looked like they had been stained red by blood that had seeped out of the layers of deep sand. On closer inspection we realized that what we thought was clotted blood was actually red chilies that had been laid out in the desert to dry. Even so, we were perplexed at the time as to how they even managed to grow in this hostile environment in the first place.



As we drove on that day we passed through smaller towns that bustled with activity and as the sun began sinking in the sky we gradually ascended up to a point that looked like a Mars-scape. The road that had been carved through enormous mounds of ochre rock made me imagine that this section must have been a nightmare for a Silk Road trader as they weaved in between these juggernauts of obstacles. In comparison we continued with relative ease into the night.

From the darkness in the back of the van Louis informed us that Turpan is located 80 meters below sea level and the lowest point in the area that we were driving towards was 150 meters below sea level. Unfortunately, informative information wasn’t the only thing to emerge from behind us. At times the aroma in the van smelt like we had a large Labrador dog in the van as a stale fart wafted from the back like thick smog given off by a Chinese coal station. At the point the smell hit Chrissy and I, we’d both look at each other; realise that neither of us was the culprit; try not to start laughing and then one of us would say to the other, ‘Oh, I’m a bit hot, I think I’ll just open the window’ or ‘I feel a bit tired. Can you open the window’. Really, we were both dying to say, ‘Chrikie Moses, what the hell is that smell?’ It soon became apparent that poor old Louis was dying for a number two when we would hear a gasp of fear and then a plea to pull over for what he said was a ‘number one’. After a while it became clear that in China a ‘number one’ actually means a ‘number two’ in Jing-lish. We finally convinced him that asking us to stop was far less of an ordeal than putting up with farts that hung in the air like a napalm bomb.

As the night wore on we finally started descending towards the ‘Oven’ – Turpan’s nickname by the locals because it is supposed to be the hottest place in China with just over 150 summer days and temperatures above 40 degrees. To me it felt like we were all of a sudden reincarnated into a Buddhist afterlife realm and we were driving towards hell on earth. The main reason for this was because we were being battered by a ferocious desert wind that felt like it swirled in all directions around the van and gave us the feeling that we were just about to be lifted off the road and flung into the desert like a tonker toy. Added to that, the noise the wind created was so loud that we had to shout to each other just to be heard. All this meant that despite the fact we were heading downhill we had to slow right down to less than 20 miles/hour. Then out of nowhere it felt like the devil him self would tear up behind me and blind me with huge spotlights. After 10 minutes he would then tear straight past us deafening us with a loud shrill. In reality it was just hundreds of over laden trucks that we had overtaken on the uphill stage of our journey that weren’t worried about the gale force wind and were using gravity to its full effect i.e. warp speed. It felt like we had driven for hours and as it was pitch black, we couldn’t see any lights of Turpan anywhere in the distance. As time wore on we realised we had accidently taken the wrong road. Luckily it was a minor road that still headed in the same direction but unfortunately it added hours onto our journey and we finally arrived in Turpan after 12 midnight.


In Turpan the next day, despite feeling tired we visited the Ancient City of Jiaohe that was destroyed by Genghis Khan and the Emin Minaret, which is the largest ancient Islamic tower in Xinjiang. (Incidentally in the picture above of the Emin Minaret, the massive hole in the wall on the right has been created by desert winds like those we had experienced driving to Turpan)

Leaving Turpan we visited Grape Valley, which exists thanks to the Karez irrigation system. The grapes have been grown on short stands here for hundreds of years and are exposed to a high amount of sunshine, which increases the sugar content and as a result the grapes that are grown and dried here taste delicious. Although it was extremely touristy we managed to get away from the crowds and drive through villages that hadn’t changed for years. The entrance to these houses had amazingly decorated doors.




We then visited the ‘Desert Park’ just out of Shanshan. If you view it from google earth on ‘satellite view’ you’ll see how it’s a small sandy desert which is encroaching on the town of Shanshan. You’ll also notice the green patches to left of the desert, which is probably Grape Valley. Although the Chinese have a slight tendency of making a location slightly tacky it was an amazing experience being able to push along a path in middle of the desert. Feeling extremely exhilarated by the experience I thought to myself, ‘Where else in the world could I do that?’. Wooooo Hoooooooooooooooooooooo!