Altai Mountains: Sun., Sept. 8 - Thurs., Sept. 12
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| A typical scene, animals being herded down the mountains, meanwhile, yurts were being taken down to be stored for the winter. Note the two round depressions where the yurts had been. |
We flew from Urumchi, which served as our central location, to Altai. (Ürümqi, or Urumchi, whose name means "beautiful pasture" in Mongolian is the largest city in China's western interior. Since the 1990s Ürümqi has developed economically and now serves as a regional transport, cultural, and commercial centre.) At the very northern region of Xinjiang Province, the Altai Mountains form a natural border between Russia and China. A national park, Kanas Lake lies at the foot of these mountains, and has recently become a very large tourist area. A traditional Kazak grazing area, you can still see large herds of grazing animals in the grasslands, and yurts that are used by the local people during the summer.
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| Summer "cottages" in the mountains for the local Kazak people |
Family Restaurant:
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| Small family restaurant |
On the way to the hotel, we stopped for lunch down a small lane at a small family restaurant that the bus driver knew. We walked into a family courtyard complete with a beautiful vegetable garden full of ripe squash, corn, beans, eggplant and squash, bordered by colorful, flowers. The family, scurried around us preparing a simple, but delicious meal of stir fried fresh vegetables and rice in a delicious sauce. Quite a joyous occasion, we all took photos of each other, while even the neighbors joined in. These kind of experiences made this a very special trip for me.
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| The whole bird - part of our delicious meal |
Halvah, Anyone?
We spent an hour before dinner meandering around the nearby market in Burquin trying to identify all the freshwater fish species for sale and available in the myriad of restaurants. (with little success) Fish are plentiful here fresh from the nearby lakes and the Ertish River, the only river in China that flows into the Arctic Ocean. Burquin has a Russian ambience to it as it is close to their border. Outside the hotel we met up with a street vendor with an enormous slab of locally made halvah loaded with dried fruits and nuts, on the back of his cart. We quickly decided to order some. The next thing we knew he was carving off a huge slab. We tried to protest that it was too big, but he was so proud and excited, so we relented.
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| 40 pounds of halvah, anyone? |
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| Cutting off our hunk |
Whine Time:
Again, we were housed in a big high rise hotel in the center of the city, with a huge, marbled lobby, giant couches and chairs, lots of marble and an air of opulence. Too bad they never vacuum the stained, gritty carpets in these places. Wifi is spotty ,and only in the lobby. While I’m at it - the beds are more like a box spring - hard as a rock! Also, the venting system for the wastewater must be very strange, because almost everywhere we’ve stayed has a distinct sewer gas smell in the bathrooms. A few places have also been lacking hot
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| Fishermen at the River |
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| The Ertish River in Burquin |
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| The hotel did provide a warm coat! |
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| Broken window handle |
Mon., Sept. 9
Route to the Altai Mountains:
Our morning routine, we piled into the bus again this time for a four hour ride through some magnificent countryside toward the Kanas Lake National Park region, where we would stay for two night. We started off driving through farmland, fields of drying sunflowers, corn and wheat. Cattle grazed on hills of yellowing grasses. As we climbed higher, rocky outcrops appeared and sheep became the predominant grazer. Yurts, single, or in small clusters, dotted the hillsides, often complete with their solar panels, satellite dishes and motorcycle parked outside. The occasional roadside stand offered animal skins, along with other tourist curiosities. The bus kept climbing around some really tight hairpin turns until we came to a plateau region with yet another flat grassy area flanked by more mountains off in the distance.
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| The grasslands turn the most marvelous shades of reds and oranges in the fall |
A Bucolic Scene:
The land took on hues of yellows, golds, oranges and reds, contrasting with the grey of the rock and dark greens of the lines of spruces that began to appear along the ridges. Stands of white birch softened the landscape with their yellows and lime greens, while the grasses flamed below them. Large herds of horses, sheep, cows and occasional camels could be seen ushered along by several people on horseback. Occasionally, we would see a yurt in the
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| A yurt being taken down for the winter |
The Russian Village:
On one of the high, but grassy plateaus we passed by a small village with very different architecture that the usual flat topped adobe homes we were used to. We persuaded the guides to stop and we spent half an hour roaming around a tiny farming village. The small wooden houses were made of rough logs, with an A frame roof. Apparently this was one of many(?) villages, built by Russians escaping the terrible devastation of the Russian Revolution during the early 1900’s.
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| An outhouse in the foreground in the Russian Village |
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| Probably a stable for animals in the winter |
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| Woman working in the field |
The border in the part of China was quite porous as the Ming Dynasty in China was losing its grip and rural northwestern China was left almost on its own. Once things calmed down in Russia many of these people abandoned China and returned to their homeland.
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| Main Street (the only street) in the Russian Village |
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| Log cabin design of the former Russian homes |
The Uyghurs and and other local people took over these villages and remain here to this day. Although there are electric poles running along the only dusty street, and motorcycles can be seen raising clouds of dust, we observed several older people pitchforking hay into untidy stacks, and men herding animals nearby on horseback. A number of small shacks around the edge of town served as outhouses, so indoor plumbing may not have yet reached these
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| The outhouse |
China’s National Parks:
It appears that China has very recently started to develop (that is a somewhat literal translation) their national parks. In one view it is making nature’s beauty available to the masses, especially important as there is an ever increasing middle class with expendable income. Hotels, restaurants, gift shops, clothing stores, etc. have sprouted up near many scenic and historic areas. Hopefully, sound land and resource management practices will be used. Like the US there is no charge for
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| Early September, and fall is in the air - white birches were golden |
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| Another ethnic group, the Tuva, live in Kanas Lake Park. They have incorporated tourism with their herding animals |
The Forestry Hotel:
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| Cows wander around our hotel grazing |
Our next port of call was a smallish hotel, one of a number of similar buildings located just outside the Park. By now our elevation was quite high, and we had to drag out every layer of clothing to stay warm. The hotel, although clean and airy inside, had all the windows and doors wide open, which made our teeth chatter. There was, however, a giant Mao - style green army coat that we could have worn as a last resort to keep warm in the closet! This particular hotel was usually reserved for forestry officials, but someone had pulled a few strings for us. Just behind our cluster of buildings was a small well established (by the look of their water system and electric poles) village of yurts. Cows, sheep and horses wandered the mountainside behind us, and a few cows browsed right outside the hotel door, ignoring the cars and people.
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| A herd of sheep |
Made In China:
It seems that everyone we encountered had the same opinion of many Chinese made goods. Of course, we have witnessed it back home with the usually shoddy crap sold in the 99 cent stores and Walmart. But we witnessed some really glaring examples, which made me feel very badly for a people who work so hard to become part of the twenty first century. These hotel building, probably less than ten, maybe less than five, years old were already going through repairs and renovations. Exterior walls were shedding plaster, some buildings were receiving new windows and doors. The almost new administrative and tourist buildings at the park had roof shingles that were broken and sliding down the roofs. Kathy went to open a window in our room and the handle broke apart in her hand.
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| Great sign... |
Bathrooms:
I would be remiss if I didn’t cover some of the basics of life anywhere on the planet - toilets. Typical Chinese toilets involve squatting down - which makes everything from that end of the body let gravity help remove, so it’s pretty natural. Hell, I even gave birth to my son squatting! The “squat” toilets ranged from a rectangular hole in the wooden floor of a crude hut, where everything just drops down into a foul smelling pile a couple of feet below you, to some quite sanitary ceramic rectangular receptacles that flushed away your offerings. In between was a variety of usually rank smelling facilities that almost never provided toilet paper, and sometimes did not flush. On a more positive, and sanitary note, all our hotels had clean, western style toilets that usually flushed. ( One, did need some coaxing as we had to open the tank to jiggle something inside to flush!)
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| The usual toilet in varying degrees of clean |
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| Your basic pit.... |
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| Freestanding handwasher |
The basic squat idea is fine, but it is tough on old knees, and since many people stand for the occasion there is urine sprinkled liberally where you stand. This is then tracked everywhere, adding to the stench. Coupled with the fact that many of these toilets don’t seem to get cleaned regularly (or at all?), it’s pretty gross. A few we visited out of desperation, just had a ceramic trench with no running or flushing water. Imagine days, weeks, (months?) of pee and poo just sitting there fermenting. You could smell these toilets from miles away. Even the domestic airlines’ toilets had years of grunge and a bad smell. It seems out of character as the Chinese wash their hands regularly and clean their teeth and mouths after meals. I guess the other end doesn’t matter as much.
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| Yet, another outhouse... |
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| And this guy just lets it all hang out! |
My Recommendations?
Use the nearest bush or rock,
Some regularly used disinfectant and cleaner would be useful,
Since even the cleanest toilets sprayed water outside the bowl when flushed, a deeper bowl would at least keep the standing area drier?????
Tues., Sept. 10
The Golds of Autumn:
Upon entering the Park we boarded an LPG powered coach for the steep ride up to the Lake. On the bus we ignored the video blaring information about the park in Chinese, and the piped in music that followed it and gazed at the beauty outside. Interesting that many of the Chinese visitors on the bus (which was all the other passengers, but our group) closed the curtains and ignored the view. Weird! Anyway we sucked it all in as the road followed a clear, bubbling river that tumbled over rocks and raced through flatter gravel beds. Against the bright blue sky, the golden leaves of the birches shimmered along the river’s edge, broken occasionally by dark, looming spruce trees that towered above the birches. At times the birches surrounded the road casting a bright yellow hue to everything. Very beautiful.
Our Hero:
As the road wound its way up the mountains we noticed a number of bus stops, where you can get out and hike or just enjoy the view. Our group split up and chose their spots. Kathy, Edie, Dulcan, Lee and I chose to hike down to the river. Now, Lee is a tiny, very spunky lady of only 86. After we all climbed down hundreds of steps, and then back up again, we all decided that we wanted to be just like Lee when we grow up. Quite a lady!
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| Ms. Lee, our hero |
We closed the day’s activities with a delicious, but chilly dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant.
Wed., Sept. 11
Lake Kanas:
This time we took the bus all the way to the lake, where we, and hundreds of Chinese tourists poured out and proceeded to push and shove along the crowded boardwalk. Often family groups laughing and shouting would brush past us as we made our way to the Lake itself. Unfortunately, it was a gray, drizzly day, so the trees’ colors were muted, and the spectacular views of the ice covered mountains was obscured. We
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| Lake Kanas |
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| Kanas River |
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| Lake Kanas again, looking toward the Russian border, some 12 miles away |
A Great Hike:
However, after lunch, the weather cleared and some of us took the opportunity to hike several miles along the lake edge to see the petroglyphs. The walk was magnificent, reminiscent of walking through the forests of Vancouver Island. Small streams and bogs made for spectacular sights of trees and logs covered with rich mosses and lichens. As we followed the lake shore, the crowds dropped off until we encountered very few people, just the occasional hiker, a lady washing her clothes in the lake and a few cows having a drink. We finally reached a rocky cliff and climbed up hundreds of steps to a stunning vista overlooking the lake and nearby snow capped mountains. Just a few miles to our north was Russia, where the rugged Altai Mountains formed a natural border.
Money Problems:
Being tourists Kathy and decided to send some postcards home, so we were quite pleased with ourselves that we successfully negotiated a purchase at a kiosk at the lake. We even found a post office nearby. We showed the clerk the post cards and she wrote a number on a piece of paper, that we should pay. However, when we started pulling out bank notes, we misinterpreted her writing and started offering her money, until we had about the equivalent of $50.00 (US). Finally, she made it clear that she only needed a fraction of that. But we felt quite foolish afterwards for pulling out such big bills for a couple of post card stamps. But at least she was honest!
Manners?
For the most part I found our fellow tourists (mainly Han Chinese) to be very kind, respectful and courteous. Older people are especially revered, and we witnessed several times that some older members of our group were helped across streets, given seats, etc. There were a few exceptions, however. The Chinese are quite loud and boisterous in an enthusiastic way in restaurants, sightseeing, on the streets, etc. This is carried to an extreme when it comes to getting on and off buses and
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| A local woman washing clothes in the lake |
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| Hike along the lake |
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| Petroglyphs |
Thurs., Sept. 12:
Merry Xmas!
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| Several families passed by with their camel herds carrying yurts and other belongings |
Woke up in the dark, 6:45 am, and took a brief shower in the chilly bathroom that sprayed water all over the toilet, The shower is part of the bathroom literally, so it sprays everywhere, quite a lot of water to clean up afterwards (like the head/showers on smaller sailboats.) After breakfast we were serenaded by digital Xmas carols that played from the garbage truck outside. It sounded like a Mr. Softee ice cream truck. Strange! A few days later were were to hear renditions of “Happy Birthday,” as the refuse collection trucks backed up outside our hotel window in Kashgar.
The Camel Trains:
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| Beasts of burden..... |
Just before we were to leave on the bus, two groups of local families paraded by our building on horseback, urging herds of about ten camels each loaded with parts of the families’ yurts.
Drive Down:
The lighting was very dramatic on our way back down from Kanas Lake. Banks of fog would occlude the views, then a break in the clouds would flood the wide valley vistas with golden light. We passed by a large dune area at the base of some rocky hills where a small go-kart business was struggling to survive. Further down, we stopped at a very picturesque area with badlands-type erosion causing beautiful rusts, golds and even purples in the soil. Lunch that day was in a very interesting family owned restaurant decorated with beautiful murals, and lots of local and non-local animals heads mounted on the walls. We discovered the lion and tiger were really fake, probably made from dog, sheep and other local creatures. Good food again!
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