China Day 15

Earlier start this morning as we needed to get to the first attraction - the Mogao Grottoes early to beat the crowds. Managed an OK local breakfast (even got a nice fried egg from the chef) and then put the luggage into the car as we weren't coming back to the hotel - bit of a shock to emerge into a freezing cold morning - 1 degree.

The grotto tour started with an excellent film giving the history of the silk road. From there we moved into a surround cinema 180 degree view in front above and behind you. This told the story of the grottoes which dated back 1500 years to the incoming Buddhist monks who started digging caves into the mountain. There are almost 500 caves but only about 40 are open to the public. We were put with a group of 30 "foreigners" including Canadians, Russians and a couple from Melbourne with an excellent English speaking guide who took us through 8 caves each of which was painted in incredible murals painted with mineral based paint so had not deteriorated in the thousand + years - covering the walls and ceilings. Also contained the obligatory Buddhas including the largest cave Buddha in China circa 35 metres high plus a sleeping (dead) one almost as long. While we've seen an awful lot of Buddhas each is worth time to look at as they are all different.

There was also a museum of Chinese musical instruments- drums or strings only - but beautifully made.

It was a quiet visitor day at the grotto today - about 5000 visitors. During Golden Week they had 25000 per day!

We also visited an art gallery where we bought a painting and were able to have our photo taken with the artist, now just got to frame it and find somewhere to put it!

Another beautiful lunch and then set off on the 2 hour journey to the railway station to head to Turpan. Doing this blog as we are doing 250kph in the train and we are due there at about 8.45. 

Footnote: Train arrived in Turpan on time (of course) and our guide for the next two days (Lucy) met us and we got to the hotel 25 minutes later. Wandered down the street and found a little family shishkabab street stall and had a fun time with them and enjoyed a little to eat. We are now very much in middle eastern Muslim culture - the hotel is very "Turkish" and the surroundings quite rough and not as clean/pristine as previuos Chinese cities. Huge room though with roses on the beds to welcome us.

This is Uighur territory so should be very interesting. A policeman stopped us as we came out of the station, checked all our passports and the Lucy's paperwork.