Dunhuang to Zhange and a sleepy Buddha

Sunday 26 October 2025

It was an early start again to catch the 08:40 train.  As we left I snapped our plastic stash of empty water bottles.  

We were through the railway security by 07:50 and noticed how the inspection/scrutinisation levels were dropping as we moved east - our mossie spray collection remained unexamined.  We travelled across the barren Gobi desert arriving at Zhangye at 12:45.  

We grabbed a taxi from the station and were a little concerned that our taxi’s boot didn’t shut once our luggage had been placed in it (a lot of cars have LPG tanks filling half the boot) but we made it to the hotel with suitcases intact.

After some much needed lunch we went to 11th Century Zhange Buddha temple.

It hosts the largest indoor clay sculptured, wooden cored, sleeping Buddha in Asia.  He is 34 m long and has a shoulder width of 7.5 m.  This is what you first see as you approach the temple.  It's only once you go inside you see his full length.

He was hard to capture in a one-r, without distortion, so I hand-made a photo montage.  (Yes, I know, JC would have done it far more professionally but you're stuck with me).

I was fascinated by his big toes (the Buddha's, not JC's).   And there were beautiful dragons too.

There were a few other halls around, which we believed were original.  

I adore Chinese roof decor.

I was interested by a room full of mini Buddhas. We thought they were named after people who had obtained enlightenment but, translating the labels, it turned out they are the names of the sponsor: usually families but I did spot a supermarket who had paid for one. 

This was a scary sign - "when thunder roars do not stay here".

We drifted around Zhangye finding a pleasant park.  It had been developed with surrounding cafes and restaurants some time back but they obviously didn’t get the footfall and most were closed.  So we ended back where we'd lunched, a food market (which China does so well) to grab some supper.

A grotto, the Hexi corridor and a geological park

Saturday 25 October 2025

Today was a long, full day consisting of more old things and ending up in a geo park for sunset.  Dunhuang sits at the western edge of the Hexi corridor.  This was an important historical narrow route flanked between the Mongolian plateau to the north and the Tibetan one to the south - so a key trade route.  Image Lang et al (2023)

We initially headed south east out of Dunhuang - more grottos!  These were the Western Thousand Buddha grottos.  These aren't a big complex and only four caves were open to us so the whole thing took under an hour.

Next stop was the Yumenguan, Yumen Pass, complex.  The Yumen Pass was established in the western end of the Hexi Corridor from the 2nd Century BCE to the 3rd Century CE.  It controlled the passage of traders/nomads moving between Western China and the land further west. 

When JC visited this in 2012, he hired a taxi that drove him into the desert up to the small fort.  Now it’s a tourist attraction with shuttle buses ferrying you around the Yumen area.  To be fair, development of these sites does add an element of control/preservation, preventing tourists from wandering over/on these ancient sites but it does seem a bit constricted.

We walked to the Small Fangpan Castle, constructed in the third year of Emperor Wu of Han’s, 108 BCE. It was empty inside and was once used as a defence command not as living quarters.

Next was the remains of the Danggu Beacon tower sat on the Han Dynasty Great Wall (it's the stone lump in the left hand image below).  This wall was part of the military defence system in the Hexi Corridor with this section stretching for 198 km. At its time, the wall was 3 m high and 3 m wide at its base, but it was never intended to be walked along as some defensive walls are.

We shuttle-bused to the Big Fangpan Castle which held supplies such as grain for the military as nothing grew out here (still doesn't).  It was 132 m long and we had time to circle it before the bus moved us on.  Spot the photographer at large.

We drove another hour west to visit the Yardang Scenic area.  Yardang is a land form created by erosion of relatively soft sedimentary rock.  Yardang land forms appear around the world, eg Spain, Namibia etc. Once again we were shuttled from spot to spot.  This was the only police station we were actively encouraged to photograph.  Like a police grotto.

Annoyingly, we weren’t allowed very close to anything.  It’s not as if we were going to carve our names in the rock, but the amazing geological features were difficult to enjoy from so far away.   They were also quite spaced out so hard to capture the totality of them from a pedestrian viewpoint - a drone would have been perfect.

This is the peacock rock. 

And this is called the fleet, from the air you can see rows and rows of rock forms looking like a fleet sailing on the sea.

Our luck turned at the last drop off where we were left to our own devices.  Of course we still had to stick to the path (not that many Chinese did mind you) but we were able to get closer to the rocks.  

We stayed until the sun went down enjoying the golden hour.  

It was a two hour drive back to Dunhuang.  I can't remember if we ate this evening or just got back late, had some nuts/bananas, packed and grabbed some sleep.

All grotto'ed out

Friday 24 October 2025

Our guide and driver collected us at 0750 today for a Mogao Cave visit.  These UNESCO World Heritage caves are world famous and contain some of the finest examples of Buddhist art spanning a period of 1,000 years.  The first caves were carved out in 366 CE for Buddhist meditation and worship.  Later they became a place of pilgrimage, and caves continued to be built at the site until the 14th century.

These the best known of the Chinese Buddhist grottoes and, along with Longmen Grottoes, which we visited last year, and Yungang Grottoes (I presume on our to-do list?) are one of the three famous ancient Buddhist sculptural sites of China.  JC last visited these in 2012: click on link to read his devotion to tracking down as many Buddhas in Gansu province in a very short space of time. 

We were grateful we had a guide with us as navigating the ticket purchase (which you have to buy in advance, but you can’t do online without a Chinese ID), introductory movies, shuttle bus and finding an English tour, would have been a challenge.

Photography is not allowed in the caves so you’ll have to believe me that we went there.  One of the caves holds one of the largest ancient Buddhas in the world at 35.5 m.  Once again, the caves were looted by explorers and not terribly well refurbished in the early 20th Century. 

JC paid extra for a private tour of two more caves which he was very excited about.  They have some caves which, due to the precious nature of the paintings, can only be visited by a small number of people a day to keep the humidity at the right level.  I wasn't interested enough to part with my money.

The exhibition area had replicas of the caves so this is the best way of sharing part of what we saw, such as this reclining Buddha.

After lunch we visited Dunhuang Museum.  It was full of the history of Dunhuang’s development from its emergence as a key trading point on the Silk Road in the 1st Century CE to present day, although most of the museum was old stuff which JC likes and doesn’t quite tick my box.  I was in a bit of a fugg after this: very tired and another day of feeling as if I’m walking around the British Museum.

JC has always been keen on archeology/Asian history so this was feeding his soul but not quite mine.  It made me feel bad thought as JC really loves it but I got bored, and felt I should try harder to adore old things too.   We walked down by the river and had coffee as per yesterday.  You can see I look a bit jaded here!

JC had another Chinese burger for supper and then it was a prompt night and nine hours sleep.

Turpan to Dunhuang - raisin to apricot country

Thursday 23 October 2025

We said farewell to Turpan today and caught a Didi (Chinese equivalent to Uber) to the station to catch the 09:15 to Liuyung.  By now we were in the swing of the system in the stations, so presented ourselves to the police and had already split our mossie spray between the luggage - in Xinjiang aerosols were limited to 150 ml per person on a train. 

We were on a fast train today so after 3.5 hours of pretty barren desert landscape we emerged at Liuyang South. Our Didi driver was waiting and 128 km, two hours later, we were in Dunhuang. 

It was a treat to arrive mid afternoon as it gave us time to orientate ourselves and, dare I say, chill before our next tour.  Our accommodation was perfect, roomy with a cute tea area.

I noted all the instructions in our block's lift.

Close by was the River Dang with a lovely riverside walk which, to my delight, had stepping stones zigzagging across the river.  Of course, I had to do these.  The river was only about 0.5 m deep (give or take depth of silt) but we still took it steadily.

We headed for the night food market but it wasn’t running yet.  So we found a touristy, but nice, coffee shop where we had americano (for me) and latte (for him) plus a delightful bowl of freeze dried fruit/veg and a platter of watermelon.  Proper Ruth snacks.  We also played cards for the first time this holiday, which indicated just how little ‘chill’ time we’d had so far.

The night market got buzzing after about 1900.  As we are moving east we are seeing more signs in English.

JC tucked into a ‘Chinese hamburger’ which was a puff pastry round, filled with chopped mutton/peppers.  He followed this with donkey yellow noodles.  

I meanwhile stuck to a bowl of rice (plov-like).  Apricots are abundant in this region so we tested the apricot tea.  It was a bit too sweet for my liking but definitely refreshing.

We stocked up on provisions on the way back to our accommodation - sometimes I feel like our holidays are one big supermarket hunt - and had an early night due to having to be up and out by 07:45 tomorrow.  No rest for the weary.