8 Days Zhangye and Badan Jaran Desert in-depth Adventure

Today your flight will touch down in Zhangye. We will meet you at the airport, transfer you to the hotel and check you in. Have a good rest.

Today we will proceed the tour to Pingshan Lake Valley, which is not far from the urban area. It is a beautiful landscape in the Zhangye Landform Landscape Grand View Garden in China, and can comparable to the Colorado Grand Canyon. Entering this rugged and labyrinth-like grand canyon, you will see the magnificent terrain, stone forest, the crisscross gullies, and forested peaks, that will feast your eyes. 

With an early start of exploring Badain Jaran Desert with different scenery and activities. This desert is home to some of the tallest stationary dunes on Earth, with some reaching a height of more than 500 meters, although most average at around 200 meters. The desert also features over 100 spring-fed lakes that lie between the dunes, some of which are fresh water while others are extremely saline. 

The Badan Lake Group consists of 13 lakes, one of which is a rare freshwater lake in the Badain Jilin Desert. The whole scenic area is lined with sand mountains and rolling scrolls. Because of the beautiful scenery of Badan Lake, which is like a bright pearl inlaid in the southern edge of Badain Jilin Desert, Badan Lake is also called "Gem Lake" by local people. We will grive back to hotel to have rest.

After breakfast at the hotel, we will take you to visit the Giant Buddha Temple, which is the important place of the Silk Road. The Giant Buddha Temple is the largest architectural relic in Gansu Province of the Western Xia (1038-1227) period. China's largest reclining Buddha is well preserved in this temple. Then, we will head to Zhongnuoritu.

Aftering breakfast, we can enjoy the attractive view of Zhongnuoritu. Nuoertu, where sand and water reflect each other, and water and sky are connected. The sandy hills and ridges overlap each other, reflecting the blue sky into the lake, like a parallel and symmetrical painting. The reeds on the shore and the flower sticks in the sand nest sway with the wind, adding a bit of agility to the "desert wonderland". Then, you will be transferred to Jirinai.

The next destination is Heisenchulu Scenic Area. Within the range of tens of square kilometers, there are many strange rocks with different shapes. The aeolian parent rock in the scenic area is Jurassic granite about 150~180 million years ago. Haisenchulu is one of the most developed areas of granite wind erosion landforms in western China, and is a natural museum for studying the formation and evolution of wind erosion landforms.

The trip will end up with back to Zhangye.

Enjoy your buffet breakfast at the hotel, then we will travel to Mati Temple where were built in Jin Dynasty. A series of horse shoe prints are visible in Grotto 9, which are said to be left by a heaven horse. As a result, the temple was named for the horseshoe prints left by the legendary heaven horse, which become the treasure of the temple. 

Next is to explore Zhangye Danxia National Geological Park for its ribbons of red, orange and yellow through the rock to create a rainbow vista contained only by the contours of the jagged mountain peaks. So many people also call it "Rainbow Mountain" for taking photos and hiking around.

We will arrange the airport transfer according to your flight schedule, wish you have a pleasant journey home!