Today (Sat 14JUN) was the longest drive to date - 577km to be exact over 9hrs. The incredible scenery made it all go by quickly and enjoyably. We drove over the high Guozigou Bridge and right next to Lake Sailimu (also known as Sayram Lake in Kazak) which is officially on the Silk Road of old. The lake is 458km2 at 2,070m. We then entered a vast long wide valley with ridges on either side. This went on for hours proving how vast China really is. We passed a mini-city built around wind farms and a solar farm the size of an Australian country town !!! It is called Xinhua Jinghe Solar PV Park and it is the biggest single solar farm I have ever seen. 10km long by 2km wide !!! It was built by the government-owned Xinhua Hydropower Company and produces 92,000MW of power every hour – enough to power 500,000 homes in Sydney !!! Amazing infrastructure.Amazing China. The rest of the trip was uneventful. Very flat with vast agricultural pastures to feed the world’s second largest population. We arrived at our hotel at 5pm with enough time to find cheese and wine !!! Our Chinese guide Shannon confirmed for me that only one Province grows olives and it is in the far east. So, nuts continue to replace my olives. I found a great restaurant next door and feasted on broccoli and spinach with plenty of garlic with beef skewers.
Up at 630am to run this city in 23C. Great run. It was Sunday so I had 6-lane boulevards all to myself. At 9am we took taxis as a group to the Xinjiang Museum where I stayed until 11am learning about the 12 official Dynasties of united China from 221BC to 1912AD. I also learnt the key differences between the two top religions in China: Buddhism and Taoism. More on both of these in a special section at the end of this post. At the museum I was asking Shannon about the number of Dynasties in the united China with hundreds of people around us speaking and carrying on. Suddenly an elderly lady dressed in uniform butts in pointing a Chinese sign at me. Shannon explained that she was asking me to be quiet. I could not believe it. Hundreds of yapping local people and she picks on me !!! I looked at Shannon in disbelief and asked why she was picking on me. Shannon just smiled. I told the attendant “request denied” and “go pick on a local” and said my goodbyes to Shannon after thanking her…
I caught a taxi from the museum to Mt Hongshan (Red Hill Park) which has the only views of the city. The 3.5km ride only cost $2.30AUD !!! Red Hill is a nice place with plenty of trees and cafes and restaurants. Being Sunday, many families were there. The place featured two temples and heaps of flowers. It was an easy walk to the top with reasonable views of Urumqi city.
Urumqi (Pop 4,084,000, Elev 860m) is the 23rd largest city in China by population. It is a regional transport node and a cultural, political and commercial centre. It also has a claim to fames as
one of the top 500 cities in the world by scientific research output.
The hotel was only 1km from Red Hill so I decided to walk back. After a quick ice-cream I proceeded to clean the truck windows which was parked nearby. Then disaster hit. I powered up my MacBook Air and could not restart my VPN (called V2BOX) – I had no access to the internet at all !!! I tried hot-spotting with William who had a VPN but no go. I was dead int the water. My iPhone did work and I managed to WHATSAPP Hamid who had given me the VPN for Iran and it had worked well in China too right up to the time I shut my MacBook down last night and tried to restart it now. Hamid explained that I had used the Hotel Wi-Fi to restart my VPN and the Chinese provider could see it and blocked it as VPNs are illegal. Hamid promised to email me a link to a new VPN to download but I needed to find someone with a hotspot running a VPN that worked in China. I had the shits that this happened. Today was a precious time to pay bills and book Mongolia and instead I spent it trying to reconnect to the outside world. I decided to bring my MacBook to the International Bazaar just in case Shannon could take me to an electronics store that could load a VPN direct to my MacBook. I joined the group at 5pm and Shannon took us to the bazaar using the underground Metro. 3 stations and 10min later we were there. The International Bazaar is simply eye-catching – thousands of locals parading around shops in a luna park style set up. My mind was elsewhere and as soon as the group dispersed, Shannon took me to a large dedicated electronics arcade 1.6km away in a taxi. This place was packed with every brand including US Drone Maker, DJI with prices same as Sydney. We tried 4 stores but they refused to load a VPN fearing fines and even persecution. Shannon and I caught a taxi back to the bazaar where I proceeded to shoot the scene – even though I was desperate to fix my MacBook, the show must go on !!! Caught a cab back to the hotel arriving at 730pm. On my way to the bazaar, Brett offered to sit down with me and download a VPN to my MacBook via his phone that has a working VPN. That evening before dinner I discovered some V2BOX config files on my laptop which I deleted along with the entire V2BOX app. Guess what ? My MacBook could now access the internet, my email, my blog and all the western websites via hotspot to Williams phone which is an HOLAFLO eSim with built-in VPN that works in China – all I had to do is download the same eSim to my iPhone and hotspot it back to my MacBook. No VPN on a laptop will work with any Chinese network (hotel Wi-Fi). Now I could enjoy dinner knowing my MacBook was on its way back…
Today was lake day but not before the best breakfast to date. The Meiyi Hotel laid out an incredible variety of hot and cold dishes which you will see in the photo below. A day trip to Tianchi Lake, also known as Heavenly Lake or Sky Lake only 194km round trip from Urumqi. Only 11 of the 18 decided to go. We left at 830am and pulled into a huge car park 28km from the lake. From here we caught smaller coaches to the lake. The place was packed with Chinese from all over China. It was like the bazaar. People everywhere. I knew I would not like this at the lake itself. The 30min ride to the lake is uphill taking us from 800m to 1800m at the lake. Once the smaller coaches drop you off you walk 600m to the lake front. We had 3hrs in total from 1130am to tour the lake. I walked with Shannon initially so I could kick off my interviews with her. It was tough to find a place to interview here given the enormous numbers of people and the noise they made. There were even outdoor speakers on poles pumping out soothing Chinese melodies. Eventually we found the right spot and from then on I was alone to explore as much of the lake waterline as possible. Tianchi Lake is a popular spot for locals to visit and swim. The lake is 1,907 metres (6,257 ft) above sea level, 3.5km by 1.4km covering 4.9 square kilometres (1.9 sq mi), 105 metres (344 ft) deep at the deepest point. The water is crystal clear and about 16C. I walked a total of 13km, most of it on the western bank which features the Xinjiang Tianchi Yaochi Buddhist Temple. I walked underneath it and much further to a peninsula jutting out into the centre of the lake with a Pagoda on it. There was no one out there and it fulfilled my wish to see this gorgeous lake alone. I walked back to the temple and caught a 10min boat back to the main entrance area. I then walked along the eastern bank facing the temple before heading back to the small coaches for the return to the truck and hotel. We arrived at the hotel at 5pm and it was all systems go to set up my new eSim-VPN using Williams phone to access and download it. Champagne Champagne for everyone !!! It worked a charm. I am now online 5G all the time including the truck subject only to signal reception and strength. I celebrated my new-found freedom with a lovely local lamb dish, wine and ice-cream.
I present to you the lake without the swarms of people…
.jpg)
THE CHINESE DYNASTIES IN A NUTSHELL:
Most historians agree that there were a total of 13 “major” Chinese Dynasties from 2060BC (Xia) to 1912AD (Qing). The longest one was the Zhou Dynasty for 790 years. A “Dynasty” is defined as the successive rule of one male family line with absolute authority. If there is no male heir or an assassination along the way then another family will rise and a new Dynasty will be initiated. There were also a number of “smaller Dynasties” that are defined as “temporary rule” in between the majors – scholars count 83 of these.
BUDDHISM vs TAOISM IN A NUTSHELL:
Buddhism seeks to end suffering and break free from the cycle of rebirth through ethical living and meditation, whereas Taoism encourages harmony with the natural world and the cosmic force of the Tao.
The following table summarises the key differences between the two:
No comments:
Post a Comment