Posts tagged as:

Gansu

After a rough week of homework and a 10-minute speech in Chinese, this photo depicts exactly what I would like to be doing right now. I got this snapshot as part of a batch of photos from my August 2009 trip to Gansu and Qinghai that showed up in my e-mail this week. It was [...]

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Just looking at this photo makes my heart ache. Changsha is slowly warming up from its winter chill, but the sun is still only an occasional visitor. I crave the hot, dry air of the Gansu desert, the feeling of the sun beating down on my shoulders and sand under my feet. I do not, [...]

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This is the fifth and final post of a weeklong series recapping my August trip to the western Chinese provinces of Gansu and Qinghai. See the first, second, third and fourth posts in the series. When I think back on the two weeks we spent in Gansu and Qinghai, the food and the funny-frustrating stories [...]

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This is the fourth post of a weeklong series recapping my August trip to the western Chinese provinces of Gansu and Qinghai. See the first, second and third posts in the series. Maybe all these posts about western China have got you thinking about a trip to the region. But how much will it cost? [...]

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This is the first post of a weeklong series recapping my August trip to the western Chinese provinces of Gansu and Qinghai. Only a month after getting back to Changsha, I have finally finished updating the site to include everything from my August trip to western China. In celebration, a week (!) of posts recapping [...]

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The Internets have provided an almost embarrassing bounty of China- and Asia-related travel stories and news in the past week, now rounded up here for your convenience. Don’t miss the latest on the mess that is traveling in China during the October holiday. Bound for China? Don’t go to Tibet: Tibet will be closed to [...]

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The Forbidden City, the Great Wall, the Terracotta Warriors: These are the “must-dos” for first-time travelers to China. By any rights, the Mogao Caves at Dunhuang belong on that list. Beginning in 366 A.D., painters traveled from all over China to the oasis town of Dunhuang to fill nearby caves with Buddhist imagery. The caves [...]

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Our trip through western China is progressing, and going well. So well that Internet access and blogging hasn’t been a top priority. But in case any readers are following in our footsteps, I wanted to write a quick post about actually getting to Langmusi and Xiahe in the Tibetan area of southern Gansu Province. Both [...]

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The fort at Jiayuguan once marked “the end of China” and the beginning of barbarian lands. It was where the Great Wall ended — and where threats to the Chinese empire might be expected to begin. Stepping into the fort, it is immediately clear that it had more in common with medieval European castles than [...]

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