Turpan Travel Blogs

People I met here who contributed to, and improved my trip: Julia (Russia), Hannes (Sweden), Portia (USA), Colin (Canada)   Normally when i board a sleeper train, i find out from the ticket collector what time we are due to arrive, so as i can be ready to get off the train. When we got on ou…

Revisiting Jiaohe city ruins with Phil, Julia, Hannes, and Colin.Bezeklik Thousand Buddha CavesTuyugou Canyon and Flaming Mountain,

Now I liked Turpan.My liking for Turpan is due in no small part to John's Information Cafe, which may be one of the finest places I've ever had a drink. Wasn't cheap, and the food was cack, but you could sit under a trellis covered so densely with grapes that not a chink of light came through. The …

Last night I bumped into an Aussie/Kiwi couple I'd seen at Karakul. They'd hired a car and driver to see the same few sights I'd had in mind. None of us could bear the thought of baking alive at places we didn't have any interest in, on the day tours that are available everywhere. So I joined in th…

If you want to go directly from Dunhuang to Turpan you have to take a 13h bus ride. There should be a train connection in the future but who knows when... So I took the only overnight bus to Turpan, the soft sleeper and spent the night squeezed in a tiny bed on a very bumpy road somewhere in a…

Buiten de stad liggen andere bezienswaardigheden als de druiven vallei, de Bezeklik Duizend Buddha grotten en twee ruïnesteden uit de tijd van de Han-dynastie. Ter plaatse kan de reisbegeleiding een facultatieve excursie organiseren waarbij je de belangrijkste bezienswaardigheden bezoekt. Verd…

After 2 days on the train, I'm finally in Turpan.  I always have a nervous and excited feeling when I leave the train station in a new city.  That feeling almost made me forget that I needed to buy an onward ticket from Turpan to Kashgar before catching a taxi from the train station to th…

reis door China van januari-april 2000

After a 22 hour train ride through the Taklamen dessert aka the dessert from which you never return we arrive in Turpan. In Turpan we hire some bikes to see the Emin Minaret and the city mosque. On our way to the Emin minaret we pass some of the old streets of Turpan and a lot of vine yards which w…

Following in the footsteps of Marco Polo by reliving the past of the Silk Roads from Syria to China, going upstream the mighty Mekong from Vietnam all the way to Tibet, see the roof of the world and more.....