16th May – Tianshui to Lanzhou

Tianshui is a medium size city of about 5 million people but driving out this morning it seems much larger. Like all Chinese cities there are a huge number of apartment buildings and more being built, Tianshui is no exception to this but it does make us wonder how many of these apartments are empty.

The Chinese certainly build fantastic bridges.

We have a 310 km drive to Lanzhou which is on the Yellow river.

We drive through mountains and tunnels again today to our morning tea stop at Shui Liam Dong, north east of the town Wu Shan. The drive in through Lu Ban  gorge is just beautiful with lilac trees scattered over amazing shaped mountains known as Daxia landform Stone Forest, which is Not unlike the Bungle Bungles.

When we arrive we park our cars under the 60 metre high cliff that has a huge mural on it.

The 42.3 metre high large Buddha In the middle is the worlds largest cliff carving. The 2 smaller figures either side are Bodhisattvas.

We take the walkway towards the cliff face over the bridge and up the stairs to get a closer look at these cliff sculptures & murals, they are fantastic. There are walkways higher up the cliff face but we’re unable to get up to them as the access is closed.  Under the large Buddha carving there are lions, deer & elephants carved into the stone. The view across to the temple is just beautiful.

We then walk through the gate up to the La Shao temple which has been built inside a large cavern of overhanging rock.  The temple looks to be wedged into the rock face, it is a beautiful & peaceful place overlooking the rocky & lush green mountains.

During the wet season there is a vale of water that falls over the rock face into a pond below.  Today water is just seeping out of the rock where small green plants grow and dripping into the pond below, its very tranquil.

There are quite a few people who live around the temple, one old gentleman that we come across is out for his morning exercise.

We buy lunch from a local vendor who is deep frying potatoes & what looks like pasties for less than $2 for both of us and it is very tasty.  Now that we’re in the countryside again we are being asked if the Chinese people can take our photo. Kay had a crying baby thrust into her arms when she said yes to a photo  and surprisingly after a bit of rocking & shooshing the baby stopped crying so they could get their photo.  A lot of the babies we’ve seen don’t have nappies on & their pants have a slit in them, not too sure how it all works but I imagine it could get quite messy! This baby had this type of pants on and of course that’s just where you’d put your hand to hold a baby up for a photo, a bit of a shock feeling bare skin!

After lunch we drive back through the gorge and TV Tony films us with his drone.

We drive onto our hotel in Lanzhou and pass another fabulous Chinese building.  When we arrive at the hotel we are presented with a welcome message on our TV.

After our nightly meeting and cold beers we head off to the night  market for something to eat.  It’s a noisy strip of stalls both sides of a road that is packed with people & bright lights. We pass on the shell fish & seafood as we’re a long way from the ocean, the sheep heads don’t look very appetising so we have a wonderful dumpling soup as we can see the lady making the dumplings, it is really tasty. We watch a Muslim drink being made from milk, eggs, fermented rice, nuts & raisins but we don’t try that tonight as I’m sure we’ll have an opportunity to do so later as we head west. Instead we have a syrup and sticky rice desert and little custard tarts. The fruit looks magnificent but it is being sprayed with water so we passed on it. Neither of us has had an upset tummy so far and we’d like to keep it that way.

After the market we catch a taxi to a bridge over the Yellow river where we get a fabulous view of pagodas lit up amongst the trees.

The bridge and  buildings are all lit up and there are people out cycling and walking with babies, children & dogs, it’s a very lively city.  Looking over the bridge the river is running very fast. We meet a local young man who speaks to us in English and we manage to have a good conversation with him.  He helps us across the main road so we can catch a taxi back to our hotel and he gives us each a red bead bracelet which is very kind of him.