How do you categorise travel? And when does it turn into an adventure?
There is a good reason for me to ask this question of you as Pam thinks I am nuts to be doing it, my doctor calls it an adventure, a mate wants to come with me and others call it a holiday.
This is it.
Citt and I meet in a city in Western China called Kashgar or (Kashi).
It is the gate to China from Central Asia. The Chinese believed it was the Gate to Heaven as anything outside and West from this gate was unknown. Today it is still the gate to the West by road as the mountain passes over the Tian Shan Mountain range which separates China from Central Asia leads to Tajikistan and in 2007 Citt and I travelled on the other side of the mountains following the old silk road. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tian_Shan
We did not complete the journey across China to Beijing as time run out for us then.
This time our aim is travel from Kashgar, Urumqui, then follow the great wall along the Mongolian border through the desert visiting Turpan, Shanshan, (an oasis famous for Grapes and wine) Kurmul, Visit the ancient Buddhist temples at Dunhuang. Then onto Jiuguan, Zhagye and onto Xian where the Warriors lay. This was the end of the road until the Mongol empire allowed for greater areas of trade. Xian was the ancient capital of China. However the Mongols changed the capital to Peking (Beijing) in the 12th century. The silk road then followed on to the Port of Tianjin linking China to Japan and the Phillipines.
It is a fact the Silk Road has been a trading route since Egyptian times with goods being traded from India and China to Cairo and Rome.
The logistics are very simple no one caravan traded the whole route. The junction cities of Xia, Urumqui, Kashgar in china and Tashkent, Somarkan, Bukara, and Merv in Uzbekistan were the main markets and junctions of the silk road where goods were sold and exchanged. In these cities the merchants and the financiers lived. It is fair to assume the structures in these places are grand. And so they are.
The caravans bought slaves, silks, drugs, carpets, salt, ceramics and other merchandise to trade and barter. Religion in various forms. Islam, Buddhism and Christianity came to town with the caravans. In earlier times Zoastrians lived in this region http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism.
It is no wonder that with all the mixture that there would be friction. It is still evident and flared in 2009. The chinese communists have flooded the area with Han immigrants as a means of suppressing the local Urghurs in the Western desert cities. Sort of genocide.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyghur_people
So is it an adventure or is it a holiday?
Come travel with us on the old silk road through some of the harshest deserts in China from Karchi to the port of Tianjin. Experience the wind in your hair and the thrill of seeing and meeting people in every day life. Take a look at their churches mosques and schools. Our trip is 11 days we will be travelling on local buses, trucks, trains and cars so you will need to be alert and ask a lot of questions. You will have Wikiipedia and google so pack up your bags turn on the computer get the kids involved as a geography, history, social, lesson and lets go. I will try to post as often as possible but in the meantime you can dig up information on the ancients and how old history is still current news.
"If you want to look into the future look into the past".
Note for all our friends. The cancer is under control.
I do agree with my oncologist doctor. It is an adventure traveling the old chinese silk road from Karchi to Tianjin. Pam is at home.
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