Day 17, 16 June 2012 Xuahua to Qinghai Hu

Today total distance traveled 443.6km


This blog is prepared in my tent by the sandy shore of Qinghai hu lake. The view from here is superb and no words can describe the feeling of tranquility in the whole surrounding area.

On our way to Qinghai hu from Xuahua, we stopped by street market to buy some fresh vegetables for our cooking tonight. We started to see the culture differences as we move further into the west, as mosque starting to replace the sight of Buddhist temples.

 Xuahua bridge where the Annual Yellow River Swimming Meet take place

 Chinese mosque

Qinghai Lake, formerly known as Koko Nur or Kukunor, is a saline lake situated in the province of Qinghai, and is the largest lakein China. The names Qinghai and Koko Nur both mean "Blue/Teal Sea/Lake" in Chinese and Mongolian. It is located about 100 kilometres (62 mi) west of the provincial capital of Xining at 3,205 m (10,515 feet) above sea level in a depression of the Tibetan Plateau.

Looking for suitable campsite around Qinghai Hu 

The lake has fluctuated in size, shrinking over much of the 20th century, but increasing since 2004. Despite its salinity, it has an abundance of fish, such as the edible naked carp (huángyú (湟鱼)).

We arrived Qinghai hu at about 1600hrs and immediately we started preparing our camp site and dinner.

 Promoting Penang to the Chinese

The wind has picked up a bit, about a couple knots northerly direction but we are very well prepared with proper gears and tents. All our camping gears are rated for cold conditions.

The outside temperature is about 5 deg celcius and the grassland is cold to touch. In the distance, birds are returning home in the last light of the day at 2100hrs. Several dogs an be heard barking, presumably the famous Tibetan mastiff used by the locals to guard their herd of yaks, sleep and goat.

The evening skies remained clear, any trace of rain clouds all but disappeared. Stars are appearing in and out between the fading twilight, and the Orion Belt and Dippers constellations clearly seen as guides, no longer relied on, but relics to remind us that where we stand today, it is because we stood upon shoulders of giants who have gone before us.

As our body warmth warms the cold air in our tent, the distant chatter drowns away, a calmer peaceful thought floods my mind, melting away all that stands in our way

Day 16, 15 June 2012 Rou Er Gai to Xuahua

Today total distance traveled 472.6km


One of our filler days, stopping over in Xuahua en route to Qinghai Hu. Left the highland and descended to a much more comfortable altitude with slightly less than 2000 meters above sea level.

 Huangloong park ranger in Rou Er Gai 

Our lunch was good at a Hui minority muslim Halal restaurant.

The Hui people (Chinese: 回族; pinyin: Huízú, Xiao'erjing: حُوِ ذَو / حواري) are a predominantly Muslim ethnic group in China. Hui people are found throughout the country, though they are concentrated mainly in the provinces of Ningxia, Qinghai, and Gansu.

In fact, the "Hui nationality" is unique among China's officially recognized ethnic minorities in that it does not have any particular non-Chinese language associated with it. Most Hui, although they are not ethnically Han Chinese, are similar in culture to Han Chinese with the exception that they practice Islam, and have some distinctive cultural characteristics as a result.

We visited the most important Tibetan Buddhism monastery outside Tibet, the Labrang monastery.

Labrang Monastery (Tibetan: བླ་བྲང་བཀྲ་ཤིས་འཁྱིལ་ Wylie: bla-brang bkra-shis-'khyil; Chinese: 拉卜楞寺 Pinyin: lābǔlèng sì) is one of the six great monasteries of the Geluk (Yellow Hat) school of Tibetan Buddhism.

In the early part of the 20th century, Labrang was by far the largest and most influential monastery in Amdo.

The monastery was founded in 1709 by the first Jamyang Zhaypa, Ngawang Tsondru. It is Tibetan Buddhism's most important monastery town outside the Tibetan Autonomous Region.

As we passed the famous Qilian mountain range, the natural border between Gansu and Qinglai province, the green and yellows sight gave way to a more barren brown surrounding. Once covered with pines, now is just grass, rubble and very fine dust from the western desert.

We passed through the Hui and Sana villages, mostly agriculture based planting canola, millet and barley.

Street boys in Xuahua town with sponsors gifts

Xuahua town is very clean and the local people are very kind and helpful to show us around. We are lucky because Xuahua town is holding her annual Yellow River swimming competition today and the town is alive with visiting participants and visitors. 

Day 15, 14 June 2012 Jiu Zhai Gou to Rou Er Gai

Today total distance traveled 313.8km

Today we drove to Huang Long (the Yellow Dragon), another World Heritage Site.

Huanglong (simplified Chinese: 黄龙; traditional Chinese: 黃龍; pinyin: Huánglóng; literally "yellow dragon") is a scenic and historic interest area in the northwest part of Sichuan, China. It is located in the southern part of the Minshanmountain range, 150 kilometres (93 mi) north-northwest of the capital Chengdu. 

This area is known for its colorful pools formed by calcite deposits, especially in Huanglonggou (Yellow Dragon Gully), as well as diverse forest ecosystems, snow-capped peaks, waterfalls and hot springs. 

Huanglong is also home to many endangered species including the Giant Panda and the Sichuan Golden Snub-nosed Monkey.

The hike up starts at about 3000m and the top of valley is about 3600m. 

After Huang Long, we drove to Ruo Er ai, a city in the Qinghai Tibetan Plateau. 

The Tibetan Plateau is surrounded by massive mountain ranges. The plateau is bordered to the south by the Himalayan range, to the north by the Kunlun Range which separates it from the Tarim Basin, and to the northeast by the Qilian Range which separates the plateau from the Hexi Corridor and Gobi Desert. 

To the east and southeast the plateau gives way to the forested gorge and ridge geography of the mountainous headwaters of the Salween, Mekong, and Yangtze rivers in western Sichuan (the Hengduan Mountains) and southwest Qinghai. In the west the curve of the rugged Karakoram range of northern Kashmir embraces it.

The view is something we don’t see everyday. There is so much to our life and we will never able to finish our learning about our world in our lifetime. 

Rou Er Gai local folks dance

Day 14, 13 June 2012 Jiu Zhai Gou

Jiuzhaigou Valley is part of the Min Shan mountain range on the edge of the Tibetan Himalayan Plateau and stretches over 72,000 hectares. It is known for its many multi-level waterfalls, colorful lakes, and snow-capped peaks. Its elevation ranges from 2,000 m to 4,500 m.

Jiuzhaigou (literally "Nine Village Valley") takes its name from the nine Tibetan villages along its length.
The remote region was inhabited by various Tibetan and Qiang peoples for centuries. Until 1975 this inaccessible area was little known.

The cold misty morning greeted us as we took a 10minutes walk from the hotel to the park entrance.

As we took the bus ride from the gate entrance up to our first stop, the sun pecked the behind the mists and cast her orange glow upon the crystal clear waters flowing down the valley.

While water is plentiful, the most of it within the park is not safe for consumption as it flows through the line stone system, picking up substantial amounts of calcium and copper ions, this making many lakes appear to have blue- ish appearance.

The size of Jiuzhaigou alone is slightly bigger than Singapore Island. The many waterfalls, lakes and waterways is the valley are a tight to bewild, though the sheer amount of tourists coming to this 25km by 30km park is somewhat of a damper.

That and the numerous cell towers dotting the landscape at conspicuous, strategic and this photogenic sites, marring its unspoiled natural beauty with mast of metal, another testament to China’s crude flirtations with modernity and little regards to aesthetics.

At around 1600hrs the rain picked up and we decided to call it a day.

In the evening we went to a Tibetan banquet and then to a Tibetan culture performance. It was a good experience.