Hotan

As responsible campers, keeping the campsite clean is an unspoken yet important rule to stand by.  It was further emphasised by Tango in the morning, reminding us that our slogan for camping out should be ‘keeping the campsite cleaner than we came’.

After a short round of collecting rubbish, we rolled out for Hotan at 9am. The drive today would be a short one, with only 250km ahead of us.

Convoy rolling out of campsite

At this point, Nadya and I had been the sole drivers for the journey. Suzhen, who could only drive an automatic, was completely relegated to passenger duty as our car was manual and we didn’t want to die at her hands.

We were glad when Zain went behind the wheel to relieve us for a while. Unfortunately, after less than two hours of driving, he was suffering from leg cramps and sleepiness (the latter caused by lack of interaction as he claimed). Nadya then took over for the remaining journey of the day.                                                                                                                                  

The drive out of the campsite was an interesting one. Besides the usual hustling and bustling of the local people, we soon noticed that almost every house along the road owned what we described as ‘mini grape tunnels’ in their homes. The grapevines would crawl up the wooden racks built in the shape of a tunnel and provide shade (as well as grapes, of course) for those who were walking under the tunnel.

Donkey cart on the main road

The day was extremely hot, a big contrast to our first camping night in Karakora Lake where we nearly froze to oblivion. The front seats especially, was getting full blast of the sun, where driver and co-driver were slowly but surely roasting under the heat.

So, it was an extremely welcome change when we got to drive through the well-known grape tunnel, where the vines provided much needed shade, cooling us down. Initially, when we were told about the visit, we had thought it required us to get out of the car for a short walk among the vines. Not realising how wide the road was in the tunnel, it was just as well that we didn’t need to get out into the heat.

Grape Tunnel

The Drive Thru

By this time, I think the hot weather was beginning to get to Nadya. She was bordering schizophrenic during the drive through the tunnel. The grape tunnel was actually built in the middle of a housing community, where children were running around freely. With the convoy driving through the tunnel in a grandiose manner, many were looking at us wide-eyed. Unfortunately, that didn’t stop them from not paying attention to the road.

Nadya was a little stressed out with the drive, worried that she might hit someone. One moment she would be going: “@#$%^, can you not run past this way? Want to die is it?” A second later, she would be going “Awwww….Look! So cute! He’s showing off his new pen to his friend.”

But I’m glad to report that as long as she got out of the driver’s seat, she was as good as cured from her psychotic bouts.

After the short drive, we were treated to another local visit to a carpet-making factory. All of the carpets were hand woven by women with silk or wool. The process was labourious and it was interesting to watch the workers go on and on with full concentration, focused on what looked like art to us but livelihood to them.

As their hands worked fastidiously, you can’t help but watch them with fascination, wondering what was their life story. Do they need the job to provide for their families? Was having a job here a coming-of-age thing for the local girls? Do they not think about leaving this town for better prospects in the city or was leaving their family behind simply not allowed for these ladies?

Hard at work weaving

Girls at work for a bigger sized carpet

 After saying goodbye to the carpet weaving girls, we had to head to our next home for the night. Passing by a bridge on the way, we looked down to a huge amount of people walking around on the sand below. All of them were carefully searching the ground right next to the streams, scanning for something. We later found out that they were fishing for white jade from the river, an item that Hotan was famous for.

The day unfortunately was getting too dark for us to join them on the riverbed. There was a long and challenging drive ahead of everyone and we had only one thing on our mind, to turn in early so that we would be refreshed enough to take on the long journey.

Karghalik

There’s nothing like waking up in the freezing cold to appreciate the sun. The cold slowed us down a little when taking down our tent. Worried that we would end up delaying the convoy for being too slow, we decided to skip breakfast altogether.

What we didn’t expect was that half the convoy had decided to do the same thing. The chefs from the previous night had also prepared breakfast for the morning and most of it had gone uneaten. I guess they really do take pride in the cooking as the convoy was later informed that the chefs were pretty upset about the wasted food.

One pretty noteworthy point about camping is the complete lack of proper toilet facilities. Behind this awesome range of mountains was the terrifying anticipation of answering the call of nature within the arms of Mother Nature herself. Being city girls, we took the joy of using a proper, clean toilet for granted. To be able to just go in the middle of nowhere coupled with the fear of being seen with your pants down literally can be a traumatising experience for girls.

But I’m proud to say that we overcame our fears that day. It was liberating to actually be able to let go of certain inhibitions that may have been imprinted on you by society. I’m not saying that I will be able to go just about anywhere, but at least I did it. Of course, it helped a lot that this zero star outdoor toilet had an awesome one hell of a five-star view.

Killer view from our 'toilet'

The convoy rolled out at 10am, heading back more than 200km to Kashgar to collect our licences and car registration plates. Before I left for this trip, I had taken the trouble to get my International licence done for the drive. What I didn’t expect was that the Chinese authorities did not recognise this licence. It was mandatory that we had to apply for a local driving licence and a temporary local licence plate for the car.
 

Roadside Scenery on the way to Kashgar

After lunch at Kashgar, it was another 200km drive to our next destination in Karghalik. It was going to be another night of camping and it was our second day without a shower. I was already feeling icky by this time, desperately wishing to have a bath.

I was doing the drive full time today, with Nadya as my co-driver. As China drives on the wrong side of the road (As a Malaysian, I am sticking to the fact that we are right and they are wrong) and our driver’s seat is on the right side of the car, it’s difficult for the driver to see oncoming cars while overtaking other vehicles. In order to drive safely on the road, it’s important that the co-driver helps out by keeping a watch.

While Nadya did a really good job, I think I sort of scared her into near-death experience by what I call decisive driving. To her, it seemed like I was running smack straight into the vehicle coming towards us, trying to kill us all. But I am confident to say that I was in total control. Sorry for the heart attack, Nadya. But the fact that you are still alive and breathing proves that I am a competent driver. Haha!

Along the way, we passed by the Taklamakan Desert. The view from the car was just a terribly long stretch of plain sand. I was a little sorry that we didn’t get to stop and enjoy the view for a while. But it was just as well since we would be visiting the desert again in our forthcoming journey.

Driving through Taklamakan Desert

The drive was long.  It was only at 8.30pm that we finally arrived at the Zepu Forest Park campsite. This time, us girls were well prepared and familiar with the tent mechanism. It may not be rocket science, but being organised plays an important part in speeding up with setting up house.

On the drive in, we spotted a proper toilet built on the campgrounds. Initially overjoyed, we would soon find ourselves totally let down by initial expectations. While it looked great from the outside, all the toilet consist of is just a hole in the middle where all the waste just laid at the bottom, bare to all who dared to take the challenge of looking down.

Toilet with lots of surprises inside

The combination of not having showered for a day and the conditions of the toilet sent a shiver down my spine. Deciding that we would somehow find a way to stay partially clean, we decided to at least wash our hands and legs, the only exposed parts of our body.  Nadya was with me on this while Suzhen, who was really relaxed about such stuff for a girl, regaled us with a scary tale of how she went five days without taking a bath before. But she joined us in the end, deciding if the two of us were to smell good, then everyone in the tent should smell good too.

While the rest of the convoy unpacked and took a short rest, 00 had to go on duty. You see, there had been problems with car 9, driven by a nice uncle that goes by the call name Brother Yong. He and his wife shared the car with two other passengers.

We had helped transport springs all the way from Kuala Lumpur to be installed into the car, and 00 finally had the time to make the fix. He and 1 Dollar, our sweeper (meaning he usually goes at the end of the convoy to make sure that every car was in place on the road), fussed over the car until near the end of dinner, a testimony of their importance and dedication to the convoy.

00 working his magic on car No.9

Dinner that night was noodles and bearing in mind the chefs who were upset about having leftover food, everyone took the extra effort to finish them up. The chefs had followed us to the campsite in a truck with a portable kitchen packed up in the back along with the ingredients. To be fair to them, their cooking was really good. It was the portions that we had a problem with, as it was too much, even for us Malaysians who live to eat.

At night, there was even a performance by an Uyghur tribe, who had an elderly uncle who sang so enthusiastically that you knew he loves his song without understanding the words. Even when the dancing girls danced until they were worn out, he still refused to stop. 

Happily singing away...

The Malaysian girls with the local tribe

Unlike last night, the weather tonight was perfect. Sleep caught up with us as we snuggled into our comfy sleeping bags.

Karakora Lake

Before I jump straight into the journey, let me briefly describe the daily ritual of the convoy. It was important that we operate according to certain rules and regulations to ensure our safety, especially since we were travelling into spots where the people and especially the authorities were going to be less accustomed to foreigners.

The convoy had to adhere at all times to instructions and were not allowed to leave the team unless it was for emergencies or if we were given permission by the team leader. Vehicles are given numbers where the sequence must be in order whilst on the road.

Every morning, we would gather at a designated time and spot decided by our team leader, Thomas (or Tango while on the road), where he would brief us on the day’s events after which we would do some stretching and prayers before rolling out. 

Oh yeah, we were also required to wear matching t-shirts as uniforms and put on name tags in order to allow people to recognise us as an entity. We were told that if the locals knew we were travelling as a large group, we would be less likely to be targeted.

Today, it was long-sleeved shirt day. After our morning briefing, we were finally officially out on the road with Lucky Seven at 10am sharp. We were headed to Karakora Lake for our first camping night with more than 200km ahead of us.

Morning Briefing

Nadya took on driver’s duty for the day and drove us all the way to the lake without batting an eyelid. But this was just the beginning and there were days where she and I pushed through behind the wheel going more than 500km, but you can read more about that in the upcoming posts. Along the way, we were treated to so many beautiful and amazing sights.

On the road

Beautiful scenery on the way to Karakora Lake

While we were excited about the adventure on the road, we can’t help but feel a little inexperienced. Our team was actually the youngest in the convoy, being made up of people in their mid to late twenties. On top of that, none of us had actually had any experience on a trip like this, except Zain, who had joined the expedition’s previous trip to but unfortunately proved to be little help. The thought of setting up camp by ourselves got us girls feeling more than a little apprehensive.

I was determined that the convoy, made up of mostly expedition veterans, would not view us as babies based on our inexperience. We may be an all girls team (Zain couldn’t count as he seldom joins us unless it was in Lucky Seven or maybe we might have thought of him as a girl as well), but we were not going to be viewed as damsels in distress. I was already organising in my head on what items to prepare for the campsite.

In order to get into Karakora Lake, the convoy had to go through a checkpoint, as entering the premises required a special permit. It was also on this first journey that we discovered the horrors of using a toilet in China. I’ve heard plenty of terrible stories about the toilets here, but coming face to face with it was another thing. In many situations, going out in the open air in the middle of nowhere with just an umbrella for cover was much more preferable than using what the locals would think of as a real toilet.

The moment we reached the designated campsite, car number 6, which housed our mechanic known as 00, recced the area for the best camping spot. When confirmed, the rest of the convoy would join him, make a circle with our vehicles and set up our camps in the middle. 

Campsite for the night

It was said that 00 got his call name by being the best driver in the worst road conditions. At one point while roughing it out in the jungle without proper roads, he was so fast that the convoy behind him claimed the title of number 01 could not hold him any longer. He was instead crowned 00 and it stuck.

The moment we hopped out of Lucky Seven, the girls immediately went to work putting up the tent. Surprisingly, we worked well together and our temporary home was set up in no time. This marked the great start of good rapport among the girls in Lucky Seven. I think it was then that we really knew we would be getting along just fine.

Putting up the tent

Karakora Lake is 3600m above sea level. The main worry of the convoy was succumbing to altitude sickness. We were given pills beforehand in the hopes that we will get acclimatised to the height, which we eventually did. We were advised to not exert ourselves and move slowly within the area.

Karakora Lake was really a beauty. The weather was a little chilly so we had to put on our jackets but the warmth of the sun made it comfortable for us to sit in the open and enjoy the breeze. It was one of those rare moments when being under the sun is considered a blessing rather than a curse. We climbed up a little hill near the campsite and took in the breathtaking view that stood before us. Right behind the lake was the majestic snow mountains covered in glaciers, which of course prompted many clicks on the camera. 

Karakora Lake

Along the side of the lake, many locals were busy trying to sell the convoy jewellery, rocks (which some claimed was jade), horse rides and camel rides. Rumour has it that one of the expedition sponsors, a man from China who owned the outdoor equipment brand, Beaume, called David, actually traded a pair of pants for a huge block of rock that could probably be jade. I say ‘probably’, because no one knows for sure if that green block is genuine, something that is always playing in our heads when buying from small stores in China.

To our surprise, we were told that dinner would be prepared for us in a nearby yurt. The walk was around 500 metres away but when the sun set, the temperature took an immediate dip that tortured most of us. Nadya especially seemed to be dying in the cold. She and Suzhen didn’t own proper gloves, lucky for them, I came to the rescue as I had two extra pairs with me. Dinner in the yurt was an interesting experience, who knew an infrastructure so simple could feel so warm and cosy. Benny the local guide told us that the yurt was build to be portable. It could be assembled and disassembled at a moment’s notice.

Entering the yurt for dinner

Yurts around the lake

Trying to fall asleep that night was a terrible experience. It wasn’t that the tent was not comfortable, but the cold was so intense that the three of us woke up repeatedly during the night. And if we did manage to fall asleep, we were plagued by weird dreams.

At zero degrees, it was not surprising that we suffered quite a bit at night. Suzhen and I tried keeping Nadya as warm as possible as she was the only one without any thermal wear. We wrapped her up so tight in between us that she was nothing more than a towering mountain of sleeping bag and warm clothes. Suzhen claimed that Nadya nearly crushed her in her sleep, but luckily had the will to survive in order to continue the trip.

When morning came, we woke up again for what was the umpteenth time in the cold to pack up, fervently hoping that the next destination would be a warm one.

Kashgar

As mentioned in the previous post, the convoy failed to appear and pick up the Lucky Seven team, which ended up with us wandering about the town of Kashgar looking to have a bite late at night.

Kashgar, situated in the Southwest extreme of Xinjiang, is made up of a good mixture of Uyghurs, Han Chinese, Kyrgyz, Tajiks and Uzbeks. Walking through the streets of Kashgar, we discovered a local bazaar near our hotel, giving us an idea of what the city was like.

Remnants of Kashgar being an important trading centre since the days of the Silk Road is reflected through the people whose ancestors had probably settled down there as a result of trading in this strategically placed centre, where the city is on the Western part of the Taklamakan desert connecting the road from Eastern and Central China.

The Night Bazzar

To this day, Kashgar is still a key trading centre and judging by the bustling bazaar, we do not doubt it at all. The difficult part though, was that despite having Suzhen with us, there was still an amount of difficulty communicating with the locals who were not Han Chinese as they go about their daily lives communicating in their own language.

Unsure of how the hygienic conditions are, we decided to have a meal in a local restaurant instead of street food. Lucky for us, it was not hard to find a Halal restaurant, as most of the people here are Muslims. Finally settling in at a restaurant where the owner could speak some form of English, we ordered the first thing we saw – chicken grilling outside this eatery.

We were a bit apprehensive at first at how the eating customs were like in Kashgar. The chicken was served on a plate sitting on top of some bread that was reminiscent of Naan bread, except that it was thicker and much tougher to chew through. But after a while, hunger set in and we just dug in the food, ignoring the strange stares from the locals who I think might be fascinated with foreigners eating in a local restaurant, away from tourist spots.

Roasted Chicken

Through the meal, one item oddly stayed in our minds. While shopping around for a place to eat, we spotted a restaurant called Iskandar where most of the patrons were enjoying cups of what looked like vanilla ice cream. When it came to dessert, I was glad that the team was in-sync. We marched down to the restaurant and got us each a cone (printed with the restaurant’s name, mind you) priced at RMB2 per piece. We couldn’t really tell the flavour, except that it was milky, creamy and good.

Ice Cream!!!

 

With our stomachs filled up, we started to be more aware of the surroundings. First thing we noticed, was that even while on the pedestrian walk, it was pretty dangerous. Silent scooters just quietly glided on the roads, where anyone was in danger of being knocked down if your attention wandered about just for a while. Apparently, instead of the usual noisy engines, the locals powered the scooters with electricity. While I find no fault in that, it was really interesting to notice that they rarely honk at people unless they were on the brink of running you down, which we experienced first hand.

The next thing we discovered was that ice cream is as popular and common as Teh Tarik in Malaysia. Instead of mamak, the people here congregated under a make-shift tarp roof with chairs facing one television, enjoying whatever show was on at the time. Next to the television would be an ice cream machine, always ready to serve the next customer with nice, cold ice cream cone.

The local hangout place

The next morning, after slaving over our car, we were rewarded to a great lunch with an awesome serving of lamb racks. 

Laaaaammmmbbbb

We couldn’t wait to tour the city with the rest of the convoy, whom we were briefly introduced to at breakfast.  Walking on the streets behind the famous Id Kah Mosque, we observed more street activity.

There was an abundance of copper kettles and teapots were being sold in the shops, which probably mean these were popular items to purchase in Kashgar. We even spotted one of the locals either making or repairing teapots by the side of the road.

Repairing copper teapots

One of the more fascinating foods for sale was this big tub of what you might describe as local style ice cream. While we were tempted to buy a big container for RMB5 from the two cute little salesmen, the huge flies buzzing on the ice cream quickly put us off. It is on a sad note I conclude that we never did find out what it tasted like. 

Local delights..

Watermelon is also very popular with the people here. Everywhere we turned, there was a cart of melons for sale, not to mention the Naan-like bread we had the previous night. The street was littered with interesting items; from knick-knacks to useful items where their function was so elusive we did not know what they were for.  We spotted a tobacco pipe-like item, which turned out to be a tool to help babies pee into the right vessels. Imagine if you bought that back to smoke it with. How embarrassing!

Watermelon for sale!

 

One worthy place to mention was this Uyghur musical instrument shop. It was passed down three generations, with a picture of the owner’s grandfather proudly hanging in the middle of the shop. Their products are hand-made using snakeskin covering the base of the string instruments. While browsing, the shop owner had a short impromptu concert, captivating our attentions for a while before turning to admire the workmanship of his hands.

Entertaining his customers with some tunes

Uyghur musical instruments

The highlight of the day was yet to come. Facing the modern infrastructure of the bustling Kashgar city was the uniquely situated old building which till this day is still housing many occupants within its ancient bellies. It’s amazing how a building like this has stood test of time. I’m not sure if I heard right, but according to our Xinjiang tour guide, Benny, it was thousands of years old.

The Old Kashgar

We were treated to a meal at a local household within the towering structure. It was fascinating to walk into the maze of walls made solely out of bricks, hay and clay to get to our destination. If it weren’t for the pretty local girl who guided us, we would be hopelessly lost within these walls. And of course, no meal would be complete here without ending it with slices of melon and a dance performance.

All in all, it had been a good day.

Lucky Seven

I have been with AirAsia since 2008 and my job requires me to travel quite a bit. One of the countries I’ve often touched ground but never truly explored, is China. When AirAsia decided to sponsor one lucky employee on a trip of a lifetime to China by holding an internal competition at the end of May this year, it immediately grabbed my attention as this was no ordinary holiday. It was a chance to discover China’s leg of the silk road! I knew I had to take part even though winning chances might be slim. Little did I know that AirAsia would ultimately announce me to be the winner, which brings me to where I am right now, literally in the middle of nowhere in China.

The Planned Route

I attended a briefing by the organiser, 4x4WorldExplorer, and it was there that I met my first teammate, Nadya. We were told that we would be joining a convoy of ten cars who will kick-start their journey on the silk road in Turkey, Istanbul.  We will be part of a second team who will fly to join the convoy in the China leg on August 7.  Both Nadya and I will be sharing a car with two others, one of whom we knew was called Zain while the fourth person remained a mystery.

It was only when we arrived at KLIA on August 6, 10pm that I found out that the mystery person was Suzhen, who was also a winner who won a seat in the 4-wheel drive that will house us for the next month.

With all team members gathered, we were now prepared for our adventure. Little did we know that the beginning of our journey was going to be a challenging one even before we got on the road in China.

View from the sky

First, our 1.55am flight on China Eastern was delayed by an hour.  While the wait was bearable, the next 17 hours was not.  The journey itself to meet up with the convoy in Kashgar, Xinjiang, China was a stand-alone challenge. It was a complete hassle and at times confusion due to language barriers and multiple transits all along the way.

Thank God we had a personal translator in the form of Suzhen, who could speak Mandarin and navigate us in at least part of the journey. I shudder to think what would happen in the case of being lost in translation.

From Kuala Lumpur, we flew to Pudong, Shanghai where things were a little havoc due to the large airport and lousy directions provided by the airport personnel. Luckily, we managed to lug our huge amount of luggage to the right counter to continue on our transit to Urumqi, where we had to wait for our flight to Kashgar, our final destination by plane.

 

Arrival at Kashgar Airport

Fully expecting to be picked up by someone from the convoy upon arrival, we were instead greeted by the fact that they were actually three hours away (something which was proved to be wrong as they arrived seven hours later instead).  On top of that, we had no idea where we were staying. Thanks to our personal translator, we managed to get the help of a friendly airport shuttle bus driver who confidently told us there were only two hotels in Kashgar (not really true, as we found out later).

Lady Luck decided to favour us right at the moment as an sms came through from a member of the convoy with the hotel name, saving us from the fate of enquiring all the hotels in Kashgar if we had a reservation with them.

To put a long story short, we FINALLY met up with them the next morning at breakfast, only to be introduced to the horror that is our car for the coming weeks.

The seventh car in the convoy, it had earned the nickname ‘Lucky Seven’ from the rest of the team by breaking down continuously in their first leg of the journey from Istanbul. Held together by an astonishing amount of duct tape, Lucky Seven had housed three guys and one girl. Being the majority in the car, the guys were not particularly attentive towards hygienic conditions, and I am being polite here.

Due to censorship purposes of the interior, we only took pictures of the outside of the car.

Fengshui being a big thing among the Chinese, must have really worked its magic here as a great change on Lucky Seven with its new occupants of three girls and a guy brought the car out of its drought of bad luck.

I knew. I KNEW that car must be cleaned inside and out for complete comfort on the road. Everything must be in its proper place and every spot must be clean. I had to bring change on this disaster that was Lucky Seven.  My teammates responded positively to what I had in mind and we laboured the morning away scrubbing and cleaning till the car shone. 

Stuff from the car to be sorted out

Car Wash!

Everything is now in place.  The team is now ready to set off on our great big adventure and we are now good to go!

Lucky Seven Team