Day 49:

Continuing from last time:

I spent two nights in Kashgar, The real highlight of that city, as I said, is the labyrinthine Old Town, and it's maze of adobe walled homes. I visited with an American traveller for an hour or two. Visitors to the sector are charged 30 yuan admission (three bucks... you gotta pay for EVERYTHING in China), but it's worth the price; certain homes that are actually lived in are open for a quick peek. We were able to see, candidly, a couple of homes of varying styles, one of which had a meal of local food laid out on a table (it looks like Uighur people sit on the floor to eat, like Koreans). We also had a wonderful guide to the town who explained everything to us. That was actually a first in China - historical sights charge massive admission fees, but without any guides, English signage, or active restoration work ones is left wondering where all the money goes.

Kashgar also has a very famous Sunday Market. It's the usual Chinese market stuff - carpets, silks, food, junk electronics, hardware, surplus from the factories supplying Wal-Mart - but as in Turpan, merely the sounds and smells of the place make a visit worthwhile. I bought a wall-hanging/blanket thing from Kirghistan (or maybe a factory in the Suburbs of Shanghai).

After visiting the market, I spent a couple of hours at a Kashgar cafe planning the next few weeks. As it exists now, my plan is to get to Tibet within the next week and a half. I met a Korean guy in Kashgar who wants to do to the same thing, but getting there from Kashgar, however, is tricky.

That guy is taking the most direct route: southwards through the mountains, directly to Lhasa at an elevation of about 5000 meters. It's illegal for foreigners to take that route, but he thinks he can dodge the cops because he looks sort of Chinese. It's been recommended to me that I take the same route - bribes and fines are easy enough, I guess - but as a solo traveller, I'm not very eager to deal with the cops here.

So... here I am now on the slow road to Lhasa, the Tibetan capital. I'm in a city called Ruoqiang, a dusty outpost in the middle of nowhere, on the south east fringes of the mighty Taklamakan desert (the largest sand-only desert in the world). My route to Tibet follows the "southern silk road" from the city of Hotan to the city of Golmud (along the desert) and then south through the mountains to Golmud by bus, through mountain passes at heights in excess of 5500 meters above sea level.

To that end, I took a 10:00 pm bus out of Kashgar, arriving in Hotan twelve hours later. I quickly hopped on ANOTHER twelve hour bus that got me to Qiemo. Twenty four hours on the road left me quite tired, but I tried my best to add another six hours to the tally, but was unable to get a drive onwards. So, I spent the night in an overpriced bed and caught a 10:00 ride onwards...

And here I am.

The ride here was decent enough. The book and website that I consulted suggested that it would be a long, bumpy fifteen hour marathon, but I guess the roads have been paved in the last year, so I did it in five.

This town is something else... it's all big wide streets and dusty (so dusty) sidewalks. The storefronts that line the streets have a big coat of sand blown in from the Taklamakan, as do all of the street signs. At first it all seemed so underpopulated... with just a couple of strangers shuffling around I felt like I was in some sort of bad post-apocalyptic sci-fi flick. A little more walking, though, lead me to find a rather pleasant little downtown core, some nice boutique shops, more wealth than I thought was possible in this region, and a population mostly Han Chinese rather than Uighur.

Nice, nice.

Next stop: a big ol' asbestos mine.