Lingyun Hotel Dunhuang

19th/20th October
Our choice of hotel in Dunhuang was superb. The location - away from the bustle of the small town - and right on the dunes - couldn't have been better. Every evening the four of us would meet on the terrace to enjoy a drink and watch the sunset. It was quite chilly, but a wonderful way to end the day.

Our first day in Dunhuang was very leisurely. We were all quite tired from ...

Dunhuang was our next stop along the Silk Road. It was a desert town where you could literately see huge sand dunes at the end of some of the roads. Our purpose there was to visit the Mogao Caves and although the caves that we saw were pretty impressive it was a bit of a disappointment. The caves were run in true Chinese tourist style. We had to have a guided tour, we could not take our cameras in and we ...

... br>
From Jiayuguan we then went to Dunhuang which is really famous for its Buddhist Grottoes, and therefore it is quite the tourist attraction, and therefore, they have lots of western style restaurants!!! I had french toast for almost every meal... Anyway. We went to the Mogao Grottoes which has the second and third largest Buddhist sculptures in China; which were something like 120 feet tall? Which now that I'm seeing that it seems impossible but that's what the guide ...

... we could not take any pictures so you will need to Google other pictures from sneaky tourists. This is a huge domestic tourist attraction and hundreds of busloads of Chinese make the 25 km trip from Dunhang each day.

Still there is plenty of room as we were guided through ten of the caves by a very good local guide. The Buddha statues hiding in the towers were over 30 metres and are cut into the sandstone cliffs.

As ...

... un moment on voyait nos réserves d'eau baisser tellement vite, on s'est tannés et on s'est dit qu'on allait revenir a 18h une fois le sable bien tièdi. On a tellement transpiré ce jour là, d'après nos calculs on a bu 8.5 litres d'eau à deux sans compter l'eau des repas etc. et on avait perpétuellement soif, c'est fou.



Puis le deuxième jour, nous sommes allés au Mogao caves, d'autres cavernes un peu ...

... and the patrons who paid for the caves. Each patron was either a person who lived in the city or a merchant who traveled across the desert, or both. Purchasing a cave dedicated to Buddha, or to a local protector spirit, was said to help one cross the desert safely. Unfortunately, the caves are very delacate, and we couldn't actually go into the real caves, but they have duplicates of some of the better preserved ones built for people to visit, which is where we went.

... At stages it was really getting to me, but you get out of those bad mind moments. One time Joost came cycling past and tried to encourage me, "Manon only 28km to go!", thanks Joost but as I am going 8km that means another 3,5hours!!! I know he meant it nicely, but man that was tough. Finally after 120km the road turned slightly which helped me enormously. So after 9 hours and 10 minutes on the bike, having left camp at 8.30am and arrived at 6.30pm I finally got there ...

... Graveur, Lasergravur Maschine, Vinyl, Laser Graveure, Laserschneidanlage, Laser-Cutter, Roland, camm1, ioline ...

... chicken) is very good in Dunhuang so we searched for that. We finally found a restaurant serving it and ordered, only to be disappointed. It was all pieces-parts of the chicken (including head and feet)...not nearly as good as the one at home in Fulicheng in Beijing! However, hilarity ensued at the restaurant when another customer came in with his purchases from the day including a new range hood for his stove. You may be ...

... somewhere with what looked more like a pressure attachment than a normal petrol pipe. The taxi driver knew I was restricted for time so I was concerned that we didn't leave town until 07:45. We headed out to Yumen Gate first. Just one lonely tower left from the Han Dynasty (206 BC - 220 AD). No Wall to be seen close by but at one point before it was abandoned in the 6th century this was the western border of the Chinese Empire. Just a few people there but a high ...