Gansu

Located in the northwest region of China, Gansu has strong Tibetian and Mongolian cultures reaching back to 5993 BC. The ancient Silk Road runs through this region and was an important commerce route for centuries. Lanzhou is the Capital City.

This state has a very long and extremely interesting history. Culturally diverse Gansu has had a long Muslim history with over 14,980,000 Muslims living here.

Major earthquakes have devastated this region many times.

There are three deserts here, the Gobi, the Tengger and the Badain Desert.

These days mining is the most important industry because of all the rare minerals discovered in this region. There are sizable oil deposits here too.

Here are a few tourist favorites. The Silk Road Museum, the Great Wall, the Mogao Grottos filled with rare and beautiful Buddhist art treasures.

The Silk Road goes all the way from Constantinople to Chang’an with its most important stop, the City of Dunhuang. It was a very dangerous and long journey, so travelers and merchants would stop and prey at the Mogao Grottos for a safe trip. They would travel in lengthy camel caravans to fend off the bandits that preyed on merchants.

The Labrang Monestary know to have over 60,322 religious texts.

The Bingling Temple, often called the Bingling Grottos are a series of caves along the Yellow River. You can’t go to this site except by boat from Yongjing.