Well, it was summer!  And I must say I put it to good use.  In particular I used part of August to take the family – and me – to China to travel down the ‘Silk Road’ spending time in Xinjiang, Gansu and Shaanxi. This part of China is extraordinary.  At least in the West, it is being in Central Asia with a Chinese accent.

With a four hour flight out of Beijing you find yourself in Urumqi or Wulumqi as the Chinese call it.  However, it is a capital without a Han majority – the majority instead held by Uighurs.  One  of the first things you note – this on the highway in from the airport to the City of over 2 million souls is that signs are in three languages – Uighur, which uses an Arabic script, Cyrillic – for all those Russians so close – and Chinese.

The travel down the Silk Road is magical though how I’d feel about traveling by caravan through this desolate Continue reading →