Yinchuan 银川 and Ningxia 宁夏

Yinchuan 银川 is the capital of Ningxia 宁夏 (also called ‚Phoenix City‘). Ningxia 宁夏 is an autonomous region in the North of China. It lays on the Yellow River and it borders, in the north, with Inner Mongolia. It is an historical city and during the time of the Tang and Han dynasties (206 BC – 907 AD) it played an important role in commerce connecting the eastern and western regions of ancient China. Ruins of the Great Wall of the Ming Dynasty can be found in east Ningxia. Temperatures: highest 39°C in summer and lowest -30°C in winter.

Places worth seeing:

– Helan Mountain; Hèlánshān 贺兰山

– Yellow River; Huánghé 黄河

– Sand-Lake (Sand Lake Scenic Resort);

– Great Wall; chángchéng 长城

– Mosques and Pagodas (Hǎibào Pagoda 海豹; the famous Buddhist architecture from the West Xia Kingdom Chengtiansi Pagoda chéngtiānsì 成天寺);

– Tombs fénmù 坟墓 (the West Xia Imperial Tombs known as the ‚Pyramids of China‘);

– a lot of sand shāzi 沙子

– oasis lǜzhōu 绿洲

– in the south of Ningxia, Liupan Mountain.

– the Desert Research Centre Shapotou, on the southern rim of the Tengger Desert, established in 1956 to find ways of preventing the sands from encroaching onto the railways, and one of China’s four singing sand dunes.

Ningxia is the home of Chinese Muslems.