A walking tour of Xining

 Xining

We had a tour of the city. From the hotel, we walked up the road towards a large square. Before we got to the square, we took a side road through an arch It was an impressive arch into a street market, and as ususal. the entrance also featured tw lions.
 

The arch, although the lions are out of shot.

There are very few traditional buildings left in the city centre. It is largely a sea of concrete, steel and glass in the form of soaring tower blocks. But in the street market, there was a traditional building, although it was modern, a sop by the planners to the traditionalists.

There are many electric cars and scooters but there are still plenty of petrol engines. Somes buses are electric but petrol driven buses remain. The pollution issue is a lot less than I remember but there is still a problem. Xining is a large city in a narrow valley surrounded by hills. There is a wind but it isn't always strong enough or in the right direction to blow away a haze above the city. Not caught by the camera are the mountains beyond the flyover in the picture. People have worn facemasks for years against the pollution until COVID when eberyone worn a mask. Things have eased and with less pollution than before, only a handful of people still wore a mask.

A view of the Nanchan Temple.

The arch at the entrance to the temple. 

                                        

A view in the opposite direction of the Kumlun Bridge over the Nanchuan River.

And then it was a clib up the steps to the temple.

Boxes for devotive candles.

Inside the temple.

Towers of prayer flags. 

Just some of the dozens of prayer wheels around the complex.

Another temple with a male lion, one of a pair, guarding the entrance.

Inside the temple, every surface is decorated, even under the eaves. 

A statue of Buddha overlooking the steps up to the temple. 

And another temple. 

Buddha.

Some of the statues inside the temple.

Another statue of Buddha.

We had spent a lot of time looking around the complex but it was time to move on. We caught a bus to get back to the city centre. In true BBC style inpartiality between religions, we were going to visit the Grand Mosque.

It is a huge building and still being built in places.It was unlike any of the mosques that we had seen coming along the Silk Road. It was large and had columns but the oof eaves were very much in a Chinese style with upturned edges and decorarted in a similar style to pagodas.

There were two minarets, but these also had curved eaves and were topped by a large clock with four clock faces.

                                                  

A view of the other minaret.

There was a large prayer area, with neatly painted lines and markers for worshippers. The whole open courtyard had huge umbrellas to protect the faithful from rain or strong sun.