Urumqi and Kashgar - Nomad trip on the Silk Road

My friend, Devrim (Turkish US) moved to Urumqi in the Western part of China around 4 months ago and ever since he has been tempting us to go and explore the nomadic Wild West with him. The teasers worked... Given the 1st May long weekend I packed up to join him for some exploring at the Silk Road.

After a long ride from Singapore, 6 hours to Beijing and 4 hours to his city, finally Pilli (Kenya) and I reached the airport where Devrim was waiting for us. We waited for Kirk from Texas (US) and later Ben (Austria) and Sophie (Germany) from Shanghai. At his place we met up with Steph (Canada) who took a bit of break after her never-ending trip, and there were two Uighur friends of Devrim, Guljahan and Menira, too to welcome us, the visitors.

First we were yumming on some delicious Uighur snacks at his Turkish atmosphered flat and then we walked around and saw a bit of the neighbourhood. Urumqi, as the capital of Xinjiang province is not quite my kind: a big polluted industrial city. But there were no worries as we were soon flying down south to Kashgar (1,100km), one of the landmarks of the ancient Silk Road!

We were quite surprised while reaching the hotel there as we realized it was not quite backpackers-alike: as we found out in this region we didn’t only have to pass the copy of our visa and passport to the police but also there were only a few hotels that had permit to host foreigners. We slept there and the next day we were ready to explore the city that, already for the first glance, looked like one must have been many decades ago.

In the streets, everywhere we could see donkey taxis: it was like a normal cart with a horse but here the horse was a donkey, much slower and people were jumping up and down from it.

The Abakh Khoja Tomb was our first destination: it is famous for being the tomb of 72 people of 5 generations of the same family. The building was very nicely architected, it used to be a pilgrimage place for Muslims but since in the last decades there have been contradicting historical stories about the place and its “magic”, I must say I did not figure it out. There was a cute orchard on the side where we watched two Uighur girls beautifully dancing for Arabic sounding music and then we headed to the livestock market.

The place absolutely stunned me, though that feeling came along with a big portion of shock, too ;-)

Sheep, camels, horses were everywhere and people in their grey-black dresses were selling them off to each other. You could drink date juice, fabulous yoghurt mix if your belly could take it all.

There were sheep with the hugest ever balls, they were sheered, sold and made into kebobs at the very same place. At the exit of the market there were local barbers sheering people who felt like getting a hair cut and expectedly-unexpectedly Devrim was one of the volunteers and got himself totally shaved.

Later, while walking towards the Kashgar bazaar, there were women on the sidewalks, having their stockings stuffed with money, accompanied by very peaceful old men and they were selling their goods all around. In the bazaar one can buy anything: nuts, cloths, carpets, hats, anything! In the late afternoon I had my International Business exam online but the others continued to explore the place, a mosque and odd architectures. This evening we met up with a guy who actually knew about the origins of Huns and Magyars (Hungarians)! So coooool!

The next day we headed towards Karakul Lake by Mustaga hill, close to the Kyrgyz border. The view was breathtaking: camels and yaks were roaming around on the endless fields right by the snowcapped mountains, peaking up as high as 7.500m! And the Karakul lake? French tourists ate up all the food in the only restaurant so our time kicked off oddly, even more so, when we realized we did not quite have a place to say.

Thanks to Guljahan and Menira there was a Kyrgyz couple that offered us their very own portable yurt to stay in (while they stayed in the farther neighbourhood) and they even made us dinner and breakfast!

In the afternoon, young locals offered us one horse and two camels so we ended up riding them for hours. The boys took us to the “neighbourhood”, a village where they stayed with their families. Their parents gave us some local specialties such as the salty tea with yak milk (really not quite my kind :-P) and home-made bread. Later they were offering us some of their own goodies and then we rode back to our yurt. In the meanwhile, four girls staying behind, together with the Kyrgyz man held on to the walls of the yurt because the winds were so strong they nearly blew our home away ;-).

Our hosts prepared some meat and soup for us for dinner, though I soon crashed out because of a mild altitude sickness... The night passed by slowly: while we were sleeping on a layer of duvet, covered with another one, I myself cuddled up to baby-size inside my sleeping bag to be least exposed to the 0-5C cold. I was looking at the roof that covered only 2/3 and through the big whole I could see the stars.

In the early morning, brushing teeth in the ice cold lake was like self-hibernation or something. The mirror lakes along the way were stunningly reflecting the snowcapped huge mountains and the Kyrgyz people we met on the roads kept on reminding me to our Kyrgyz friend, Aibek and how cool it is to see this much of his world, even if it is probably not really the same.

Next we headed towards to Taklamakan desert where first time in my life I could (literally) flavour the taste of the desert: mild wind was steering up the sand while we walked on the dunes, in 35C heath, under the bright shiny blue sky.

At night we flew back to Urumqi. After a longer rest Devrim and Guljahan made us breakfast themselves and then we all headed to the Urumqi Museum where first time in my life I saw a mummy! Not one that looks like the Egyptian ones in the movies because they were not wrapped, just coated with some chemicals, they got pruned and even after centuries you could actually recognize their faces! Amazing!

As back in Singapore a corporate run and a weekend seminar at the university was awaiting me, I again took on a 10-hour-ride back to reality! But what a nomadic adventure this was at the Silk Road! Wooow! Thanks, Devrim…

For more pictures, check this out!