Day 30: Silk Road Treasures

I went to visit the Mo4 Gao1 Ku1 (MoGao Caves) in the morning. But before I show you the caves, let me share with you the most interesting traffic light that I had ever seen. This traffic light has a countdown status bar which I find it rather unique.



Ok, back to the caves. Here at MoGao cave is where you can find one of the grestest repositories of Buddhist art in the world. The founding of the first cave was in AD 366. It was an important place along the silk road as traders come here to pray and thanks the buddha for the safe journey through the treacherous empty land to the west.



As it was the national day of China, many chinese travellers were here as well. It was so pack.



No photographs were allowed to be taken inside the caves as part of an effort to preserve the caves and the items within. So I can only show you how the caves look like from the outside.













It was a really interesting site. You should see it for yourself. Then I made my way to Ming2 Sha1 Shan1, a place where the desert meets oasis in the most dramatic fashion as describled by lonely planet.

Along the way.







MingSha Shan.



Here's a video of the surroundings.



Many people rent the shoe cover to prevent sands from entering their shoes. I did not get one as I am wearing boots.



There are a few ways which you can enjoy this desert. You can either view it from the top without putting in any effort,



You can ride a camel,



or you can walk. I chose to walk. So together with some chinese students that I met in the BinGuan, we began our long walk into the desert.



Here are some pictures taken.























It was a pretty tiring walk.













But the view at the top was rewarding. From here, we can see the Crescent Moon Lake, a mirculous lake in the desert.



Here's a video taken from one of the peaks.



For your information, the sand here consist of 5 different colours.



Taking a break.



Here are the pictures taken from our rest point.























While resting, I played with the sands.









and then we played with our shadows.







Seeing that the sun was about to set, we decided to go to an even higher peak for the sunset.



Lazy to walk, we slided down from this peak,



and began our climb up to another higher peak.



I am getting old. This young girl can climb faster than me.





Taking photos of myself again.





A nice footrpint left behind by a lizard.



Soon it was getting darker and darker.









And I just lied in the desert waiting for the sun to set.





It was an amazing sight. Here are some different moments of the sunset.













Ok, after the great sunset, we are now left in total darkness and we have to find our way out. Hmmm... this did not come across my mind before.



After some hard work, we made it out. Then we went back to town and went to the night market to have our dinner. Guess what did I have this time?









Its called Da4 Pan2 Ji1. A whole chicken cut up and stir fried with noodles, onions and pepper and then drowned in a pool of chilli sauce. Sounds good?


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