Sooner or later, any traveler in Xinjiang will find themselves going through Urumqi, even if only to finesse transport connections. And so it was for me. I needed to get to Urumqi by late afternoon of June 23 and spend the night at a local hotel, in order to make an early morning flight from Urumqi Airport to Kashgar on the 24th. Getting to Kashgar on Sunday the 24th in the morning was critical, as that was the only opportunity I’d have to see the Sunday Animal Market.
Urumqi is the capital of Xinjiang and a large, fairly industrial city. There’s nothing much attractive about it, yet I find it not the hopeless basket case that others sometimes describe it to be. Although now a Han-majority city, it still has large minority groups of Hui and Uighurs, and smaller minorities such as Kazahks, Mongolians, etc. that have come to the city for economic advancement. Certainly the place is busy and buzzing with activity, and plenty of shiny new construction of buildings and infrastructure continues to take place. And it certainly looked like some good meals were there for the finding.
The bus journey from Turpan to Urumqi was easy and had no intermediate stops to pick up or drop passengers. The overall journey took about 3 hours, and included a brief pitstop at an unspeakable-toilet place about halfway through the journey. Also outside of Urumqi, a security checkpoint where all passengers had to get off the bus and walk through a metal detector and show ID. The bus driver took the bus to the other side of the checkpoint. All the Chinese ID’s were being read with a little machine, but with my passport, the guard just flipped to the info page, looked at me, shrugged and handed it back. Our bus had no apparent issues (escaped convicts, terrorists, domestic agitators, etc.) so we all reboarded and after the conductor did a head count, were on our way again. We arrived in Urumqi at 16:30 to complete chaos at the bus station in the south part of town. Looked like this chaos was typical though. Out at the road and with no empty official taxis within grabbing distance and I was being continuously outmaneuvered by nimble locals, I availed myself of a “black taxi” (private nonlivery vehicle) with a lady driver, for flat rate of RMB 30 to my hotel....which I estimated was probably 40-50% over the legitimate rate given the distance. Sometimes one just has to suck it up.
Got to hotel near People’s Park about 17:00, checked in and did a rough cleanup, then off for a quick walk in the Park before finding a friendly ATM machine to refill my wallet and to find food. By good fortune, I had picked an interesting and colorful neighborhood to find the necessities of life within a 15-minute walk, including a nice branch of my favorite China Merchants Bank and the evening food market. The latter was a real find, all sorts of luscious, cheap, and safe food, cooked fresh and hot by the vendors in front of my very eyes. I had some spicy lamb skewers and a spicy roasted chicken burrito thing (carved off the rotisserie spit and put in a Xinjiang tortilla). Taco Bell needs to come and take notes—this stuff was delicious, and particularly when washed down with some cold local beer. Plastic tables and chairs set up outside, and the place was full of happy locals eating and socializing. Everybody very friendly—and from the looks and nods I was getting, not that many foreigners around these parts, but I felt quite welcome.
The day was another blue-sky (marvelous considering Urumqi’s normal state of pollution) and not too hot so the early evening had plenty of locals out and about, including plenty of people in and around People’s Park. As it was a Saturday, most of Urumqi’s families seemed to be strolling happily about on their leisure day, plenty of eating and shopping going on. On my walk back to the hotel, I was particularly gratified to find at a convenience store, the first Coke Zeroes (cold also!) since leaving Xi’an. Celebrated by buying and drinking two (I’m a hopeless addict to Coke Light and Coke Zero so the last 8 days had been tough.) Topped off an unexpectedly pleasant evening with a fabulous shower (rainshower head) and excellent water pressure with steady water temperature. And water than stayed in the enclosure and went properly down the drain instead of all over the rest of the room. Hey, on the Silk Road, that ranks right up there, as far as the good times go!
So far, Urumqi looked pretty darn good from my perspective, and while a big city, it had a decent vibe to it—and not threatening at all. I was looking forward to my return pass through the city (post-Kashgar) and a chance to see a little bit more, especially the main Xinjiang Museum, which is Urumqi’s main tourist attraction.