Trip to QINGHAI LAKE

As August comes, Chongqing becomes inhabitable again with 44 degrees temperature and 85% humidity. We decide to escape this baking oven, heading to the clear blue sky, chill comfortable fresh air, Qinghai Lake, which is the largest lake in China with 3200m altitude, 360KM in girth. We travelled from 200m to 4400m and settle at 3200m altitude. In total it covered 3000KM.

Get equipment done and team assembled. Whole company started holiday trip.

There are three main bikes

1: click water cooling 150cc Bosch Efi. We improved suspension system, brake system, induction system and new Efi mapping.

The second one is CRF250L with Bosch Efi mapping

The third one is XR250L with new plastic parts from new mold.

Three bike together

We ride to West Sichuan plateau, the first city is Songpan with 2850 altitude, temperature drop to 25 degrees from over 40 degrees. SongPan is a historical city with well-preserved old city wall and building which has been there for more than 1000 years. Because it is far to the midland and high altitude, it was not disturbed by any war in the past, we are lucky enough to see the building over 1000 years old.

From song pan to the west it is Tibet high altitude plateau, from 2800m to 3300m there are great vast grassland—RuoerGai grassland. The main life stocks are yaks and sheep. It is seldom see caws. Only these two kinds of animal can lift in this high altitude and harsh environment.

Over 3300m the grassland turns to GObei Desert immediately in Gansu Province. The transformation is accomplished with 10KM in distance. When driving with a car, it only takes 10 minutes. The feeling is just like in a movie, it happens but the mind feels it is not real.

Sheep live on the cliff with ease.

Food is totally different from southern China tasted, wheat flour bread, or Nang, is made the same way as in Iran and Turkey. It is huge in size with hard thick skin, soft inside. The way of baking can make this bread storage time longer than a month without any artificial Preservative. The best mate for these bread are lamb meat and yogurt.

Qinghai Lake is the largest lake in China, which Evaporation rate is bigger than incoming water. All water is salty like sea water. Qinghai means ‘Green Sea’, this describes its enormous size with 360KM in girth。There is a small island in the center of the lake, Monks will practice meditation in winter on the Island. The whole lake is covered in Ice between October and March. The Island will be isolated with the outside world, and becomes bare nature.

After passing Qinghai Lake, the mother river of China Huanghe carved this land into 700m deep great canyon. With the descending on altitude, it becomes extremely hot and dry, the landscape change from grassland to Gobi desert immediately. Chinese government built the first high altitude hydro power plant in 1960s which is called longyang Gorge power station. The water dam accumulates 180M water level difference and build great energy conservation. The dynamic pressure is higher than the three Gorges Dam, but it is 40 years earlier than the world biggest water dam.

Hydraulic energy turns to Electric energy through water turning the rotor blade.

Not only generate power, but also This water dam has created a 44KM long and 14Km wide lake on 3200m altitude, average depth over 150m, the water temperature is below 10 degrees all years round. The is perfect for Trout farm. This fish was not seen in this region before.

In the night we enjoy relaxing moment in willow tree shade, and taste the nicest local product here.

Trout sashimi.

This fish meat is not easy to see the fat line between red meat. It means the fish is healthy and athletic, there is no extra fat build up. The meat taste more chewy.

Hand lamb

The lamb is simply stew with water for two hours with no other ingredient, when serve, it eats with chili pepper powder. The meat is tender and no fishy smell at all. There is just pure lamb meat flavor. Because the water and land here is Alkaline, this property makes lamb meat in a unique flavor here.

Even kid love it so much.

Kebab is another must order dish.

CAST iron cooked lamb. It is called charcoal pot locally.

All the ingredients were buried in hot charcoal in a thick cast iron pot. The lid of the pot is sealed cast iron, the food is cooked all around. With 1 hour even heating up, the flavor is well blended. This way of cooking is definitely from nomads groups. I saw the same way of cooking in Kazakhstan, Iran, Turkey, and Russia.

Last but not least. The melon here is very high sugar content, because of long sunlight and big temperature difference between day and night. It is super sweet and has flower flavor. The fruit is not crunchy, but soft, because there is too much sugar content is too high and reduce the water content percentage.

In the 10 days trip, we saw great nature, the power of earth growth, the power of human being build unbelievable project, we experienced great culture heritage which is still lively existing all over the world. We are small particles in the great world.