Keketuohai (可可托海, also spelled Koktokay) is a dramatic river-gorge national geological park in Fuyun County, Altay Prefecture, in the north of Xinjiang, China. Here the Ertix (Irtysh) River has carved…
Baihaba village is a peaceful hamlet of log cabins and golden birch trees sitting right on the China–Kazakhstan border, inside the Kanas scenic area of Altay Prefecture, Xinjiang, China. Often…
Qiongkushitai is a remote Kazakh village of timber houses and grazing horses tucked into a green valley of Tekes County, in the Yili region of Xinjiang, China. Far from the…
The Kalajun grassland is one of the most beautiful alpine meadows in Xinjiang, China, a sweep of green hills embroidered with wildflowers that rolls toward the snow-dusted peaks of the…
Chaka Salt Lake sits at 3,100 meters in Qinghai province, about 300 km west of Xining. Locals call it “Mirror of the Sky” because on a calm, clear day the…
Wild peach blossoms blanketing a Nyingchi valley with snow peaks behind I still remember the morning I first stepped out of the car near the Yarlung Tsangpo river in Nyingchi,…
I still remember the first morning I woke up in Kashgar. I had arrived on the overnight train from Urumqi, groggy and unsure what to expect, and stepped out into…
The first time I stood on the Hulunbuir Grassland, I stopped talking. There was simply nothing to say. A wind rolled in from somewhere past the horizon, bent the grass…
I still remember the first time I stood at the foot of the Helan Mountains, squinting into the low northern sun. I had come to Ningxia expecting little more than…
I still remember the moment the bus rounded the last bend and the mountain simply appeared. There it was — a solitary, rounded peak rising out of the green folds…