A whole day of driving to Dunhuang

Malene did get sick during the night and didn't sleep much. Chinese food: 1 - Malene: 0. So it was with a bit of a worry we began the 12-13 hour drive to Dunhuang. Luckly the roads were very good and with a seat in the front of the truck she managed to get through the day.

Not much to tell otherwise. We were on the road at 6 am. Desert like scenery as we have seen for the last couple of days. Just quick breaks to stretch the lake and then we were in Dunhuang for dinner.

Not a very interesting road

Would you like the "Staffed aborigine slices"?

Always be prepared. Accessories in the hotel room

Turpan - hottest place in China

A bit of sightseeing on the program today. We went to see the Jiaohe ruins and then a museum about the Karez water irrigation system.

We went back to the restaurant from yesterday evening to have lunch. David, Kate, Muriel, Cameron and Carl joined. Afterwards we went for a walk and ended up spending most of the time in an underground shopping area just browsing around.

After a nap we when to the night market. In Turpan it's an early night market and closes around 8 pm. Tomorrow we'll have an early start and a 12-13 hour drive to Dunhuang and to make it easy for everyone and not stopping too long for lunch everybody is bringing their own breakfast and lunch to eat in the truck. We went around in the market and bought bread, almonds, dates, raisins and bananas.

We decided to go back to the cafe next to our hotel to have dinner. A lot people had their laundry done and in order to get it cheapest all was done together. We got it back at the cafe and then the clothes hunt began since it was all mixed together. Malene only had one pair of trousers Mikkel a bit more. One of his black t-shirts are still missing. Maybe it's in one of the other backpacks. Maybe laundry fairy took it.

Going back to the hotel Malene started to feel bit sick. Let's see if the Chines food flu will hit her.

Who wouldn't like a dish of Stomach of cold hair

Jiaohe Ruins

Carl

Malene and Nico

Always exciting to see how the icecream is compared to the picture

There's always time to try on a hat

Even the Chinese police officers like to have their picture taken

At the Karez water irrigation museum - Leaders' great attention!

Going out for lunch

Underground shopping mall. Not all shops are rented out

Always safety first

No we didn't try it

Shasliq eggs

Some impressive teeth

Had a bit of this

Our ugly hotel

Heavenly Lake take two

Mikkel got up and walked around Urumqui with David and Malene walked around with Lotti and David. On Malenes walk she went to a park area with a small lake and open squares where a lot of Chinese people where doing their morning exercise - everything from dancing to Tai Chi and other Chinese ways of exercising. Different groups did different things. It seemed liked you just put your music on and did your exercise where ever there was room. It was quite fascinating to watch and it could have been fun to join.

We made a group decision on not going to the museum which we missed yesterday. It would have been too much to cram into a day with the museum, second attempt for Heavenly Lake for a walk for  a coupple hours (without a yurt camp) and then drive to Turpan.

Heavenly lake was maybe not heavenly but it was still nice and we had a good walk. We also entered "Chinese tourist land". Everything was very controlled and organised. We left our truck at the parking lot and then we had to take a shuttle bus to the lake. There was music at the lake and you could go for a boatride. Some people from our group found it very touristed which it was compared to most of the places we have visited the last two months, but it wasn't much different from what you experience in Europe, Australia, US etc. We have just been spoiled with less developed tourist countries.

After a couple of hours of walking we drove for a few hours and arrived in Turpan - one of the hottest places on earth. It wasn't hot hot when we arrived just pleasently warm.

We went out for dinner with David and Cameron and found a nice place with several outdoor restaurants. Once again we enjoyed a fantastic meal...though one of the dishes turned out to be peanuts instead of beans...Malene had seen the dish at another table and thought it was beans....Instead of enjoying beans we trained our chopstick skills. We managed to eat all the peanuts with chopsticks! 

David getting a coffee in the morning with Mikkel 

Tired waiter early in the morning

Nico and Mikkel with a random Chinese guide

Trying a hat

Enjoying an icecream

Kong fu fighting - almost possible to see the pagoda in the background

One of many great signs here

So many Chinese people to have your photo taken with

Popular spot to take wedding pictures. Maybe not so special with 10 other couples

More kong fu fighting

Hey we found the little Chinese mermaid

Lots of shuttle busses ready to drive 

Yes, they are only talking about the urinal below 

Many windmills along the road

Saying hello to a tiny kitty in one off the gas stations