Jiayuguan – Dunhuang #5

(Im on a roll)

Dunhuang. Oh Dunhuang…a voice in my head said that I would’ve live here if I could. Lol that was how good the impression I get from this place. Everything was nice from the weather, people, the parks. Overall experience here was superb. We enjoyed it soo much. Easily because of the sand dunes! Ive never saw one in my life so that won me over fast. Lmao

We were at Dunhuang in the early morning. We creeped closer to Xinjiang by reaching Dunhuang. It was also one of the important Silk Road routes. We got a ride with a nice uncle who tried hard to understand us and translate app but he just couldnt get that we were asking about the attraction sites. He parked the cab at the front of the hotel and video called his English taught daughter to speak to us. We spent half an hour trying to get a ride with him to the sites in an agreement that he could understand…he apologized for language barrier and we were like nahhh we’re sorry too we are severely lacking by not learning at least conversational Mandarin before actually going to China without a travel guide 😂 we could understand simple sentences but couldnt reply back. With no local sim card to connect to Wifis…this would be the most important tip for a China trip when you’re not a Mandarin speaker. Get local sim card!! And install VPN (I have it) but without internet it’s kinda useless.

The empty boulevard in early morning

We checked in just for an hour of freshening up and wend out to get breakfast. The hotel was at walking distance to noodle places as well as nice looking restaurants. We decided to splurge a little by going inside this beautiful door to a fancily decorated dining area with uniformed waitress treating us to a welcome juice in tall glasses. Nice eh? The price werent too pricey and the food tastes good. A local guy who spoke fluent English greeted us while we were going out the building. He introduced himself as the owner’s son and wanted to know our thoughts about the place. He had with him a huge ass bike too. That was random, to notice he had a big bike but that amused me 😆 we walked out to the townspeople waking up and starting the day in full swing. There was a little traffic and there was a group of mixed age Tai Chi practitioners at one side of a busy street.

The cab uncle came by at the specified time to bring us to the Mogao Grottoes. We didnt know it was actually a 2 part trip through the museum where you will have a visual presentation of the history and parts of the Grottoes since it wasnt all preserved and opened to public. A large part was still in conservation, others were just too fragile to be exposed to the public. The modern looking museum also is where you take the shuttle bus to the actual site. As I said, these parks are just sooo huge.

The 1/4 chicken we ordered

The bus ride to the Grottoes

Mogao Grottoes are a network of underground Buddhist shrines built through 10 dynasties. The fact that it was quite recently discovered is mindblowing. It was there for a looong time buried under the desert. The arid weather preserves much of it that we can see today. The shrines are built individually with own styles. The decorations and the vanity of a shrine signify the owner’s wealth and prosperity at the time it was built. You can’t take photos inside so I have nothing to share but the outline of the caves.

One shrine that is set for public use unlike all the other shrines were the one by the only Chinese Empress Wu Zetian. She made her shrine for everyone to use regardless of their status in society. It was an impressive chamber to pray and offer offerings. The Grottoes are a strong example of the cultural and economic exchange of the East and West set by the Silk Road and even before it was recognized. The materials and technique used to build each shrine spanning 1000 years is a must see 😭😭

It was noon and we still have half a day to go for the sand dunes. I mean you can’t say you’ve been to western China and not see the sand dunes right?? We get a different driver for this trip because it’s farther away out from the city. We parted ways from the kind uncle. He was genuinely worried about how we, 2 women getting around by ourselves 😅

The moment we arrived at the sand dunes it was late, it was just so far and we were hoping to be lucky enough to arrive on time. The parking lot and the entrance werent close. We ran like crazy to see the ticket booth still opens. We get some of the last tickets because the place needed hours to ride the shuttles and trek the dunes. That’s why they will close around 5pm to avoid people getting lost inside when it’s dark.

I can’t tell you how mindblowing it was to me but I never thought about the scale of it. IT WAS LIKE A MOUNTAIN. Of cold prickly sand. There were camel rides as well but we decided to trek by foot.

The Crescent Lake!!

Sorry for the quality. Wish I brought myself an actual camera but I dont know if I could pack a heavy old Sony camera. I make a point to bring a camera next time…the amount of stuff I’d have taken from this place alone!! Spending 2 hours arent enough.

At 8pm we must get the ride to the train station which wasnt the one we were from when we arrived that morning (damn it was one of the best 12 hours of my life) it was at Liuyuan, another 2 hours ride out of the city. I researched the stations that were connected to Turpan / Tulufan in the type of coach that we booked. I couldn’t get through from other station. So we took a pricey and long ride into the night. Just pitch black one lane road…I still remember the numbing cold. After 2 hours, the sleepy Liuyuan, demolishing our need for a nice hot noodle bowls and little shopping before getting on the train. We felt unsafe staying outside the station. It was dark and empty. If you look around that area of the town was at the edge. There was nothing else.

Luckily the station had a number of people in the waiting room. We didnt feel so creeped out. A smiling female staff came to us to specifically explained the train numbers etc in English because obviously we looked like we didnt speak Mandarin. That lifted our spirit a bit. I dont know, the ride towards Liuyuan and the town itself were draining and it was nearing midnight. We boarded the train but found no available seats side by side. This was about a week doing this and it wasnt any surprise anymore. We took any barely empty seats we could find and said to each other, see you in the morning.

I forgot to tell you how it surprised me the first time I boarded the K train back in Jiayuguan. There were no assigned seats, people lie and sleep anywhere they could and their feet dangling in the aisle barricading you from walking through. And the smell? As expected, like feet 😂😂

One time I was in China #2 Xi’an – Lanzhou

So Im updating the previous post. The next morning we checked out. The management allowed us to store our bags at the reception and came back in the evening to pick it up and find a taxi for the ride to the train station. Actually the city is well connected with a metro system but sincr we were noobs and dont want to walk too much we decided to flag a taxi. To get us out from the alleys we took a small trishaw like vehicle and found a taxi afterwards.

I was quite shocked to see the huge train hub. Even at night the place is packed and lines are long. In its proximity there were security gates and your stuff will get checked by uniformed forces. An officer asked me something in Mandarin but after 3 times he gave up and let me go lmao. It was dizzying to navigate for first timers but luckily diytravel.com website that we prebooked the tickets from had all the instructions to ease the whole process. To communicate I used translate app together with typed phrases on a piece of paper and plastered it wide on the surface of the glass interface lol the staff quickly get to business and we were done in about 15minutes from getting our tickets printed to queuing for entry to the waiting hall. Can you imagine only patrons with tickets get to enter the building. All the buzz we saw outside were people who had arrived early to wait for their entry when the time comes. The whole freaking building is ONLY for waiting! Then I remembered how huge this city is in itself. Couldnt be compared to where Im from lol!

As usual locals looked at you all the time when you’re around them. Walking through a super long horizontal seating area in like a huge ass hall to see the current trains docking and departing gets a lil overwhelming as we werent experienced travelers and never been to China. It was all very interesting and mind boggling at the same time just observing the way things are run and how the people acted around themselves. The walk to the underground railway was cold and unexpectedly long and rushed. I thought Im gonna miss it (I felt like this at every train stations on this trip 😂) we get to our 4people sleeper room. There was this old couple that stayed with us. Without understanding a word between us we all managed to somehow connect..idk how to explain it. But it was nice…I get to sleep the shit out of that 7hrs ride. On trips I tend to fully enjoy the act of sleep. In normal times this is unnatural to me. So anyway we arrived at 6.30am in Lanzhou. And omg it was so cold, to us, who are hot blooded creatures from the equator and it was 9c of the final tip of winter in central Asia.

Lanzhou Train Station

Ko Samui in September

Idk if I’m ready to write about my latest trip
I’m still gushing about it in my livingroom now
It was sooo full of funny moments and weird awkward stares and new experiences
It wasn’t so much tho
If we have a full 6 days it’ll be soo much better in terms of places and things that we could do
because
even after reading and searching through the internet for the so-called travelogs by people who have went there,
NO ONE mentioned about the long transportation between one point to another.
this fucks every plan you might be having lol
ok so I will tell you how my vacation went

Day 1 (25/9) Sunday
We all had a really hectic weekend to close off before jetting away to Thailand
It is the longest holiday Ive ever asked for from my boss so far (about 3 years working) lol
so I have the best feeling but also very lukewarm since work thoughts always catching up at the back of our minds
And I made a joke when my boss asked me to always turned on whatsapp for updates
I’m like K
And so are all my friends 😂😂

We are all still very much invested in our respective work
Idk but Ive never went on holiday that I completely turned off from work lol

Anyway
First day, nothing, just us tryna reach the island and checked in the hotel so that we could get a shower and rest
You can’t even explain how boring it is the ride from the airport, to the island
air-land-water-land. Took about 3-3.5 hours. From the plane to trying to catch the bus (it was very well organized but still it can be hard due to one thing : bad english)
So a lot of funny miscommunications took place
Then when we get on the bus, a guy chatted with me and as usual I’m far than interested I mean I can’t sleep on the entire flight, sleepy and my eyes looks horrible and I feel less than attractive (that’s fucking why I avoid social interactions while on travels maybe I’d do differently if I’m confident or when the days my skin cooperates with me lol)
I found an excuse to not continue talking (it was just a few questions anyway lool)
still don’t have that on-vacation feeling, like your life is untied from anything that grounded you to wherever you’re currently based on,
it’ll affect how you go through the day.

When we reached the jetty it was already about 3 o clock in the evening, and it’s just hot and tiring but there is the big ferry waiting for us
It’s the first time ive ever board that kind of ferry (like the on in the game Euro Truck hahah)
It’s a big ass ferry. For a long ass journey. so it makes sense…
the outdoor seats isn’t comfortable to sleep but it’s nice with the sea breeze and the slow nature of it all…
Inside it’s loud with the sound of the Thai TV and people talking but it’s cool with aircon
an hour and a half feels like a day spent just sitting on the iron benches lol
we disembarked on Koh Samui’s Donsak jetty. There’s another 2-3 minutes walk through the bridge until you meet the drivers from Phantip Travel
waiting for you
since they can’t speak understandable English they spoke one words and we gotta catch em as they say it
then you just follow which vans that will go to your respective hotels

The van ride…it’s quite long to arrive to our place in Chaweng Beach. It’s further up the hill specifically
All the winding roads and the occasional traffic and the hike……it’ll take you 15-20mins from one beach to another major beach
This trip is meant as a getaway..not the gritty backpacking type (which I love) but I just came out of 6 months without a vacation so yeah I was literally begging for a nice comfy hotel up in the cliffs with smacking views…though I wasnt physically prepared for a vacation. Half of my mind can’t believe yesterday I’m scrambling through work and today I’m in Thailand
like how the fuck did I got here

The resort is really nice, has a 4 star feeling to it and everything is rustic and elegant
just a lil run down in some areas but the viewsssss
immediately can see myself one day living with this as my backyard lol

We ate stuff from my only friend that purchase the 15kg luggage – because she loves extra clothes and she brought us food yay
At around 8 pm we asked the front desk about taxi services and one guy pulled up in a white Nissan SUV (Nissan is massive in Koh Samui)
Taxis in Koh Samui are nice cars. I saw same situation in Surat Thani so idk if it’s a Thailand thing. Ive only been to Thailand twice.
Their police cars are sedans and I even caught one BMW. Damn
We googled for halal restaurants and found like three. Hmmm seems like the travelogs aren’t reliable. Maybe they went around looking on a motorbike? But if the ‘easy to find’ restaurants aren’t up on the internet we wouldn’t be able to find it.
We ate usual warung stuff like Tom Yam and Deep Fried Prawns etc it weren’t great tasting but nice enough
Not cheap…more on the pricey side. But hey it’s Koh Samui. Everything is above average prices here.
I went to the mart for a Fanta drink and find myself at a communication challenge with the cashier guy
My friend trying to ask the sim card price and he couldn’t understand the word ‘Money’
There was the price written on the cards though so check on it before you ask them in English cause it’ll save your time
It was funny trying to understand each other
And in Thailand you WILL get straws when buying drinks…I’ve observed this and it’s pretty funny cause you’ll end up with lots of unused straws when you’re about to throw the plastics away

My friends came from another convenience store cum mobile shop at the other side of the road with a story to tell.
The transactions went on with a sketchy looking guy…and a pistol on top of the table.
I laughed so bad to this because I can’t even imagine buying a freaking sim card from a guy with a pistol but really that was what happened…!
They have a shooting range in Koh Samui after all so maybe it’s legal idk but it’s funny as hell
The guy was nice and tried helping to write in Thai to help them get stuff from the other mart where the staff couldn’t understand English
Aaaanndd that was how the first day finished! Pretty much nothing right? Just that we get lots of ideas for our Thai English jokes and talk about how nice Thai people are