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Wuwei
Wuwei is a charming city, located at the eastern end of the Hexi corridor in northern Gansu province.
It was where the famous "Heavenly Horse" was discovered - a bronze horse in full gallop on the back of a flying swallow. The original bronze is in Lanzhou's Gansu Provincial Museum (but even that is rumoured to be a copy!). The centre of Wuwei is bright, cheerful and attractive. I had been expecting the usual dreaded "power station+coal mine+tannery+cement works" town so characteristic of many norther Chinese towns, but Wuwei is rather laid back. The old town, a prominent stop on the old Silk Route, is right at the heart of things and there are plenty of older buildings to admire.
Wuwei lies on a river which is formed from snow melt from the mountains behind, so the wide gravelly river bed is dry for much of the year (but the water continues to flow below ground).
Outside town, to the south-east off the Lanzhou highway, I saw a substantial stupa complex, but didn't have the time to explore more closely.
"The Qin Great Wall - east of Wuwei"
You can get a taxi - or rent a car - to take you into the rich farmlands to the east of Wuwei, where the Qin Great Wall sweeps down from the north before blocking access to the plain behind. To the north is the Tengger Shamo, the southern fringes of the Great Gobi Desert. The Qin wall loops curiously north around Wuwei because the farmland either side of the river has always been so fertile.
In northern Guyang county, the wall strides across the flat plain, the beacon towers visible for several kilometres.
"The farm at Hedong"
It is an attractive, pastoral setting, with fortified homes and friendly local people growing carrots, sweet potatoes, maize and wheat. Apricots and apples are grown in small groves among stands of silver birch and beech trees.
Head for Hedong village where the Zhou family live in the shadows of the Great Wall and will tell you how their family have farmed here for 225 years. You will never meet a friendlier family.
On the Silk Road, west is Zhangye and east (or southeast in this case) is Lanzhou. However, the area of Gulang County and Shuangta to the east is also worth a day or two of exploration.
