IFreeing.

Places, connected

Cities and places across Xinjiang

From the Tian Shan to the Tarim Basin, this regional view places the magazine’s cities and selected sites in context. City markers are approximate orientation points; peaks indicate summits, not heritage boundaries or entrances.

Xinjiang · China
Ürümqi Changji Karamay Turpan Hami Ili Bortala Altay Tacheng Bayingolin Aksu Kashgar Hotan Kizilsu Ürümqi Grand Bazaar Bogda Grape Valley Yar City Tomur Kizil Caves Jiya

Simplified physical geography · orientation only

These places remain in the list without map markers because the available coordinates do not identify a reliable point.

Natural Earth
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Turpan.

Turpan sits below the mountains in an extremely dry basin. Its stories here are the karez, the drying rooms of Grape Valley, and Yar City, kept distinct from Qocho.

Turpan

Looking up a shaft in the Turpan karez museum, with the channel below and a lit grating above.

From shaft to pool

A karez is a sequence of holes, a dark channel, a ditch and a pond, made so that water spends less time in the sun.

Grapes, then a room of shade

In Grape Valley the fresh fruit and the drying room are part of one walk, from irrigated vine to hanging bunch.

Aerial view of the Yar terrace between two channels, with poplars along the cliffs and fields beyond.

A city cut downward

Yar City stands on a terrace between two channels, with rooms made by digging rather than by building up.

Aerial view of the earthen city of Qocho, with fields around it and the Flaming Mountains behind.

Rammed up, not dug down

Qocho, east of Turpan, raised its walls in layers of earth and kept three enclosures inside them. Yar, the other inscribed city in the basin, was cut into its terrace instead.

Turpan

Turpan

Turpan karez

Vertical shafts, an underground channel, an open ditch and a pool.

Turpan

Grape Valley

A planted valley where vines and drying rooms stand within sight of each other.

Turpan

Yar City

An earthen city on a terrace between two channels, inscribed as a Silk Road component.
Photo credits and rights
  1. Inside the karez museum at Turpan: the shaft above the underground channel.Tomskyhaha · CC BY-SA 4.0 Photo source ↗ Rights information ↗