SYX → SVX

Now, it’s time for another travel-related installment.

Sanya is a good place to get some R&R by the sea and catch up on sleep; if only the holidays weren’t so short…. Once again it’s time to board a plane, and… twiddle my thumbs for 3.5 hours, waiting for departure clearance. Yeah, such things happen here every now and again. Later, I heard that at the same time, some people had to wait for 6 hours for their departure at Beijing airport! That would be enough to drive you mad… When you’re actually traveling in a plane, time passes much quicker than when your departure is delayed indefinitely, and you’re just sitting around in the airport building or in a plane next to the runway.

And finally we’re airborne!

This place is sunny, the clouds are fluffy white, it’s all cheery, and palm trees line the sandy beaches.

After we have flown a little deeper into mainland China, the weather changes dramatically into the more familiar Chinese climate. The clouds are quite thick, lined up in several layers, making sure the sun cannot break through to the land below…

They say they have a real problem with the sun here. An old friend of mine worked in Chengdu for two months, and he said he couldn’t remember a single sunny day there. And on my visits to Beijing, I’ve only ever seen the sun when they dispersed the clouds especially for a parade.

A little further north the mountains get higher, so the weather improves.

Somewhere down there are the multi-colored bowls of Huanglong and Lake Jiuzhaigou.

It’s a pity we didn’t fly over Tibet – we just flew over a small corner of it.

Instead of mountains there is endless desert.

Urumqi:

I’ve never visited Urumqi, but had a layover once in the local airport. Wow, that was 6 years ago! Time flies.

Here are the Tien Shan mountains.

Somewhere beneath those clouds is mount Khan Tengri and lake Issyk-Kul. I’ll make a note here for myself – I’ll be returning to this topic shortly.

Then it got dark. Just a little more to go…

…just a couple more hours to go…

…and we are there.

So that was my SYX-SVX trip. (Those were airport codes, just in case you were wondering.)