On Thursday night we covered another 1,200 km East on overnight train N858 from Dunhuang. We arrived at 9am in Lanzhou, a city of 3 million people and the capital of Gansu province. Lanzhou is sometimes stated to be the most polluted city on Earth. True, when we arrived the air was hazy but it is very hard to believe that there are not many places on Earth with much worse pollution than this. Any air pollution notwithstanding, Lanzhou is a pleasant city with many attractive, modern buildings. It is hemmed in by mountains to both the north and south, and the Yellow River bisects the city.On Saturday morning we caught a taxi to the riverside and after a short stroll along the promenade we had lunch at a cafe that looked out over the fast-moving silty water. Then we moved on to the bus station hoping to get tickets to Xiahe in southern Gansu. This is a very beautiful mountainous area with a large Tibetan population and the largest Tibetan monastery outside of Lhasa. From there we hoped to continue south to Langmusi on the border with Sichuan, and on to Songpan in Sichuan province. Songpan is close to Jiuzhaigou Alpine Nature Reserve, considered by many to be China's No. 1 natural feature. Unfortunately the roads south of Jiuzhaigou were badly damaged by the recent earthquake and the only way currently to enter from the south is by air from Sichuan's capital city, Chengdu. The Nature Reserve itself has been shut since the earthquake but, we believe, is due to re-open on 8 July.
As we were already in Gansu province, only a few hundred kilometres north of Jiuzhaigou, we thought that travelling south through Xiahe would provide a very scenic and expeditious way to get to Jiuzhaigou at about the time it reopened. The only complication was that Xiahe has recently been off limits to foreigners for other reasons so we were not sure if our intended route would be viable, but we intended to find out. At the Lanzhou bus station we were told that foreigners could not travel on the bus to Xiahe but that we could buy a ticket to the nearby town of Linxia, home to a large population of Chinese Hui Muslims. So we did. When we arrived in Linxia we attempted to buy tickets on a bus to Xiahe but were told that foreigners could not travel on this bus. We spoke with a taxi driver on the street who told us that Xiahe had recently been re-opened to tourists and that he could take us there in his taxi. So we went with him. It was a beautiful two hour drive through steep-sided green mountain valleys intensively planted with crops of vegetables and irridescent canola. Passing through a long mountain tunnel marked the transition from predominantly Chinese Hui Muslim countryside dotted with attractive mosques to predominantly Tibetan countryside.
On our arrival in Xiahe at around 8pm we walked down the main street to find a hotel. Several appeared to be shut. We found an open one and went in - the manager seemed very surprised to see us and told us that Xiahe had still not been reopened to foreigners. This was unsettling and not what we wanted to hear, so we decided not to tarry in Xiahe. The following morning we visited the Sangke Grasslands just out of town where Tibetan herders graze their animals in summer, and the large Labrang Tibetan monastery in the town, home to about 1,400 monks. At the latter, in addition to many very photogenic buildings, we saw a group of hundreds of monks throat chanting, and a display of decorative flowers and other objects carved from dyed yak butter. Then we moved on to the bus station and bought tickets to Hezuo, about two hours further south. There was no problem buying the tickets, and with Xiahe behind us, we thought that any issues regarding our presence in the area would be resolved. But as we entered Hezuo the bus was stopped at a military-police roadblock, and police came on board to do some checking. On spotting a western face, they politely asked us to get off the bus and we and the bus driver were taken across the road for questioning regarding our recent and intended future travel plans. The driver was admonished for bringing foreigners on the bus in this area, and it was decided that we would now go to the police station for further discussions. While these events unfolded, the bus remained parked and the other passengers stared intently at the proceedings across the road. The bus luggage compartments were opened up and our baggage was removed. The driver was then free to go and the bus took off, with 35 sets of eyes trained on the two foreigners standing forlornly in the retreating distance.
We were then taken in a police van to the town's police station where it was explained to us that this area, including Xiahe, was still currently off-limits to foreign tourists, and that we should not be in the area, and that this requirement was for our own welfare. The soldier and police officers who accompanied us to the station were polite and friendly. They insisted on carrying our backpacks, offered us a cigarette, and gave us a peach drink while we awaited the arrival of the station leader who had been called in from his Sunday afternoon off to deal with our case. We pleaded our case to be allowed to continue our journey southward, but we were advised that there was only one option for our next travel movement. North - Back to Lanzhou. The case decided, we returned to the van and were driven back to the highway roadblock to await the next bus north to Lanzhou. When it approached it was stopped and the driver was told to take us to Lanzhou. Again, under the watchful gaze of the bus passengers, we emerged from the police van and boarded the bus while our baggage was being stowed underneath. Although retracing our steps of the previous 48 hours was not what we had in mind, the return journey through such beautiful countryside was still pleasant, and we arrived back in Lanzhou at about 8pm on Sunday night. We checked into a hotel next to the train station as we intended to stay in Lanzhou for only as long as it took to develop a Plan B. We will probably now travel by train to Chengdu.
We had come tantalizingly close to reaching Jiuzhaigou from the north - only about 350 km to go from Hezuo. Now, returned to Lanzhou, we face a circuitous route of nearly 2,000 km to get there. And at considerably more expense too, might I add. Still, we tried, and in any case we had got to see beautiful Xiahe and surrounds and the picturesque Labrang monastery, so it was a very interesting trip despite the sudden termination of that particular travel segment.
While in the lobby of our hotel next to the Lanzhou train station we met a Frenchman just come in from the deserts of Inner Mongolia. Lee Tuan struck up a conversation with him and today the three of us had lunch together at a nearby cafe. He leads a very interesting life - he's an engineer and crew member on Gitana 13, a multi-hulled carbon-fibre ocean racing yacht. The vessel, sponsored by the Rothschild Corporation, speeds around the world racing the clock. It's currently in dry dock in Hong Kong after sailing from New York to San Francisco (via Cape Horn!), then to China. Its next leg beginning in August is back to Europe. While the boat is in dry dock the crew is on R&R, and our new acquaintance headed off to see the Inner Mongolian desert before flying home to France later this week. The story of the Gitana 13 and its sister vessels is told at the following website:
