Dunhuang, China

An Oasis in the China of the Sands


path to the desert
A boulevard that leads to the first dunes found by the Dunhuang oasis, in the City of Sands.
the oldest wall
Chinese friends in the ruins of the oldest and most western section of the Great Wall of China, built during the Han dynasty.
vegetable desert
Desert surface covered with gardens, achieved by irrigation through channels that distribute water from rivers.
All ready
Camels and small cars prepared to drive newly arrived visitors to the Mingshan dunes.
PUB
Store decorated with advertisement for a Chinese cooking sauce.
Yumenguan Pass II
Yumenguan Gorge fortress wall with Taklamakan desert dunes in background.
a drink for the way
Statue next to the Yumenguan Pass fortress.
Child labor
Young helpers of Uighur cooks in a traditional restaurant in Dunhuang.
SLOWLY !
Signal urges drivers of small dune service vehicles to drive unhurriedly.
sand circuit
Visitors caravan skirts the base of a Minghsan dune.
Yumenguan Pass II
Tower and portico of the medieval fortress of the Yumenguan Gorge.
Above all
Chinese tourists enjoy the Crescent Lake.
1 step forward, 2 back
Chinese visitors conquer the steep dunes of Migshan, Dunhuang Sand City.
Buddhism vs Islam
Top of Dunhuang Mosque seen there; of a clothesline of traditional Chinese lamps.
without showing the face
Ha Fei Sai, Muslim maid at an Islamic cloth and clothing store.
Lunar Oasis
The Crescent Lake, fed by underground springs beneath the dunes of the Taklamakan Desert.
Entrance to Mogao
The Buddhist portico building of the Mogao Caves complex.
camelids
Road decoration with running clay camels.
Path to the desert II
A boulevard that leads to the first dunes found by the Dunhuang oasis, in the City of Sands.
Thousands of kilometers west of Beijing, the Great Wall has its western end and the China and other. An unexpected splash of vegetable green breaks up the arid expanse all around. Announces Dunhuang, formerly crucial outpost on the Silk Road, today an intriguing city at the base of Asia's largest sand dunes.

Only any water miracle could justify what the oval frame of the plane reveals to us, down there. For hours we have flown over a dry and earthy nowhere, inhospitable and soulless to match. Eventually, this absolute nothingness in the south of the vast province of Inner Mongolia, in domains of the old Silk Road, appears sprinkled with green patches of Dunhuang that seem horticultural to us.

They are repeated in such a way that they form a dense grid of rectangular minifundia, some of a deeper green than the providential water that irrigated them.

vegetable desert

Desert surface covered with gardens, achieved by irrigation through channels that distribute water from rivers.

As soon as we leave the air-conditioned airport, the dry thirty-odd degrees that are felt begin to brown us. With the wind blowing east from the deserts, the atmosphere remains dusty.

When the worst storms here spread, it is this same reinforced wind and the sand from the surroundings that reach up to Beijing and make the capital's environment heavier and more unbreathable than ever.

The Fruitful Modernity of the Silk Road

We realized, at a glance, how much Dunhuang's historical profile and look had yielded to Han modernity that, from the Pacific Ocean to the confines of the Tibet, has long been shaping Chinese territory. The old mud-brick houses gave way to prefabricated buildings. Some have two or three floors. The ones in the surroundings, even more than that.

One of the city's streets, Yangguan Dong Lu, is home to Shazhou's slender market. When we investigate it, we come across an expected but curious relationship between the predominant landscape and the products. They were mostly dry, or parched in a way that was still composed and seductive.

Over a length of tens of meters, there are square receptacles and a fascinating abundance of hazelnuts, walnuts, almonds, peanuts, pine nuts, pistachios, separated by varieties and sizes.

Dried fruits for sale in Dunhuang

Store decorated with advertisement for a Chinese cooking sauce.

We are accompanied by dates, raisins, peaches, plums, sloes, figs and who knows what else, wrinkled, caramelized or salty, dictates the experience of the inhabitants of these parts to be prepared to last longer without losing flavor. This is followed by spices with a thousand tones, textures and aromas.

Fruits and spices have always been present at the Asian crossroads that immortalized these parts. And yet, throughout history, countless goods have been haggled around here.

Once known as Shazhou (as the market) and Dukhan in the Uighur dialect, from the XNUMXth to the XNUMXth century, Dunhuang thrived at the intersection of two of the primordial branches of the Silk Road and became the main point of contact between the China and the rest of the world.

The Pioneer Passage of Marco Polo and Family

It was one of the main cities found by merchants arriving from the West. Of these, Marco Polo was the most reputable. His father Niccolò and uncle Maffeo traveled to the East and met Kublai Khan, even before they met Marco. In 1269, they returned with a letter sent by the emperor to Pope Clement IV who had died the year before.

The father and uncle obtained a missive in reply, but already from Pope Gregory X. In 1271, they left once more for the mysterious Cathay – that was how the China – at the head of a caravan loaded with valuable goods. This time, they took Marco, who was already seventeen years old and had wanted this trip for several years. They would only return twenty-four years later, Venice was at war.

Visitors caravan on Minghsan Dune, Dunhuang, China

Visitors caravan skirts the base of a Minghsan dune.

The trio crossed the Mediterranean and the Black Sea and, on their way to Baghdad, the Tigris and the Euphrates. They crossed Iran, the Pamir Mountains and the terrible Gobi Desert.

Before meeting Kublai Khan at his summer palace in Shang Du – now Inner Mongolia – and inaugurating a seventeen-year stay in the emperor's service, they stayed for a year in Dunhuang. There they visited the famous Mogao caves.

We found them on the opposite bank of the Dachuan River, on a rutted cliff that hides a complex system of nearly five hundred temple caves, atriums and interior passages. A kind of nine-story convex pagoda with balconies that narrow from the floor to the cupola was adapted to the rock wall and serves as a religious portal.

Portico of the Mogas Caves in Dunhuang, China

The Buddhist portico building of the Mogao Caves complex

The Possible Discovery of the Buddhist Caves of Mogao

It is there that a government official welcomes us with somewhat snobbish ways, explains the historical context of each cave and painting and, even though he is aware of our enormous frustration, makes sure that we do not photograph them even half the time: "These times are gone." communicates to us from the top of your Han haughtiness. “We are now serious protectionists. If you want pictures, check out our bookstore. Instead of photos, they can take some wonderful books.”

Dunhuang was not alone at a commercial crossroads. With the caravans came the various faiths. For convenience, Buddhism was already represented there. Since the fourth century AD, caves began to be occupied, multiplied and painted.

The story goes that a monk named Le Zun had a vision of thousand buddhas bathed in golden light on that very spot and that this vision inspired him to build a small sanctuary. Soon other monks joined him. Gradually, the original cave evolved into today's complex.

At first, they served only as a hermit retreat. Later, with the financial contribution of believers who arrived via the Silk Road, they were transformed into true underground monasteries that, hall after hall, continued to amaze us.

The paintings made here are considered a true masterpiece of the Buddhist world. For the first time, Chinese, Uighur and other ethnicities that passed through there were attributed faces to a religion and to its sage and prophet who, until then, were visually regarded as Hindus.

The Explosive Han Rituals in a Uighur and Muslim Domain

We return to the center of Dunhuang. As we search for a mundane landing for lunch we find ourselves confronted with the explosive opening of a new family restaurant. According to the Han ritual of blessing for fortune, the owners set off hundreds of firecrackers scattered around the door and along the sidewalk.

Chinese mosque and lamps, Dunhuang, China

Top of Dunhuang Mosque seen there; of a clothesline of traditional Chinese lamps.

Surprised (read, frightened) by the unexpected celebrations, we and other Uighur passersby ran to the safety of the ceremony.

The Han ethnic group has long controlled this China western. In 111 BC, it was governed by a dynasty of the same name. This dynasty established its authority in Dunhuang as one of four outposts against incursions by the Xiongnu nomadic confederation.

Yumenguan Pass gantry, China

Tower and portico of the medieval fortress of the Yumenguan Gorge.

The city name translates as “Flaming Lighthouse”. It was thus known due to the habit of imperial guards lighting huge torches to alert the population of these attacks.

Indeed, it was after a devastating incursion by the fearsome Huns that, between 141 and 87 BC, Emperor Wu ordered the construction of the first segment of the Great wall of China, 1300 years before the sections ordered by the Ming dynasty.

Brief Expedition to the Taklamakan Desert

On another day of exploration, we left town very early. We ventured into the Taklamakan with the aim of confronting this same Great wall of China, which establishes its western limit.

But the primordial wall was made of the clay available around it, not stone like the rest. We admire how little of it we find and, a few kilometers away, also the medieval fortress of the Yumenguan gorge.

the oldest wall

Chinese friends in the ruins of the oldest and most western section of the Great Wall of China, built during the Han dynasty.

We return to the asphalt, still driven by a driver who almost made his old vehicle fly. We crossed villages lost in the desert's aridity. Finally, we stop at the Yadan National Geological Park, right in the middle of the Gobi Desert.

There, we admire the countless blocks of rock that make up such a Devil's City, carved by erosion into whimsical shapes and spread across the endless sand.

The wind that has always blown between these obstacles continues to produce the same hissing and other mysterious sounds that frightened the wary caravans of bandits on their way to Dunhuang, the base city we returned to long after sunset.

Yumenguan Gorge Fortress Wall, Dunhuang, China

Yumenguan Gorge fortress wall with Taklamakan desert dunes in background.

Half Drift in the very stuffy Dunhuang

The new day awakens with an atmosphere unclouded by dust. We took the opportunity to better explore the modernized urban center. The more we investigate, the more we see the duality between Uighur Muslim culture and Han Buddhist or atheist culture.

In one street, a decorative clothesline with large hanging Chinese red-yellow lamps blurs the view of the minaret and dome of the city's great mosque. Young people with bold hairstyles and garments worthy of Shanghai's westernized neighborhoods explored hairdressers avant-garde.

Next door, Ha Fei Sai, a shop assistant hidden inside a hijab and a half-translucent veil pulled up to her almond-shaped eyes, looked after a house of Islamic fabrics and costumes.

Ha Fei Sai, shop employee in Dunhuang, China

Ha Fei Sai, the Muslim maid of an Islamic cloth and clothing store.

We talked for a while and then left her to her tasks. We also left Dunhuang working. We get on a small bus and take the short trip to your “City of Sands"

A rare traffic light stops us at the beginning of a boulevard. We took advantage of the interregnum and peeked through the front window. When we do this, a mirage devastates us: a gigantic mountain of sand juts out from the asphalt floor, funneled between the two arboreal hedges of the boulevard.

Entrance to Dunhuang Sand City, China

A boulevard that leads to the first dunes found by the Dunhuang oasis, in the City of Sands.

At its base, a Buddhist portal accentuates the grandeur of the introductory dunes, called the Sand Singing Mountains. There, the Dunhuang oasis submits to the immensity of the desert. Eager to unveil its massive shore, we bought tickets and crossed the portico.

The Surreal Mirage of Dunhuang's Singing Sands

On the other side, more and more dunes are revealed to us. It's a kind of amusement park that the Han authorities have set up to impress fellow visitors. We don't see a single foreigner around.

It is only Chinese who ride the camels that the freezing winter (they have an average of – 8º) in these parts makes fuzzy, in long caravans that climb to the top of certain dunes.

Chinese visitors from Dunhuang, China

Chinese visitors conquer the steep dunes of Migshan, Dunhuang Sand City.

And, it is only Chinese who, on foot and in slow motion, conquer others, nearby, not as imposing as the summits that reach 1715 meters in altitude.

Meanwhile, panoramic delta-wing squadrons fly over them all and the yellow desert, then return to the ground in the vicinity of a supposedly emblematic Chinese Air Force plane carcass.

But Dunhuang's geological and scenic wonders don't stop there. We follow a flat trail. A short time later, we come across a verdant lake fed by underground springs and, as the baptism of Crescent Lake suggests, in the shape of a crescent moon. A Buddhist pavilion appears in the concave area of ​​the Moon.

Chinese tourists enjoy Crescent Lake, Dunhuang, China

Chinese tourists enjoy the Crescent Lake

It gives it some mysticism and blesses those, like us, who pass through it. We visited it and conquered the edge of one of the dunes in a hurry to reach the top before the sun stopped illuminating the scene.

We force the heart and lungs into undeserved violence. To compensate, we feast our eyes and mind with a rest somewhere between the contemplative and the magical, over the sunset and high above the lake.

Dali, China

The Surrealist China of Dali

Embedded in a magical lakeside setting, the ancient capital of the Bai people has remained, until some time ago, a refuge for the backpacker community of travelers. The social and economic changes of China they fomented the invasion of Chinese to discover the southwest corner of the nation.
Bingling Yes, China

The Canyon of a Thousand Buddhas

For more than a millennium and at least seven dynasties, Chinese devotees have extolled their religious belief with the legacy of sculpture in a remote strait of the Yellow River. If you disembark in the Canyon of Thousand Buddhas, you may not find all the sculptures, but you will find a stunning Buddhist shrine.
Lijiang, China

A Gray City but Little

Seen from afar, its vast houses are dreary, but Lijiang's centuries-old sidewalks and canals are more folkloric than ever. This city once shone as the grandiose capital of the Naxi people. Today, floods of Chinese visitors who fight for the quasi-theme park it have become take it by storm.
Longsheng, China

Huang Luo: the Chinese Village of the Longest Hairs

In a multi-ethnic region covered with terraced rice paddies, the women of Huang Luo have surrendered to the same hairy obsession. They let the longest hair in the world grow, years on end, to an average length of 170 to 200 cm. Oddly enough, to keep them beautiful and shiny, they only use water and rice.
Kolmanskop, Namíbia

Generated by the Diamonds of Namibe, Abandoned to its Sands

It was the discovery of a bountiful diamond field in 1908 that gave rise to the foundation and surreal opulence of Kolmanskop. Less than 50 years later, gemstones have run out. The inhabitants left the village to the desert.
Lüderitz, Namibia

Wilkommen in Africa

Chancellor Bismarck has always disdained overseas possessions. Against his will and all odds, in the middle of the Race for Africa, merchant Adolf Lüderitz forced Germany to take over an inhospitable corner of the continent. The homonymous city prospered and preserves one of the most eccentric heritages of the Germanic empire.
Lijiang e Yangshuo, China

An Impressive China

One of the most respected Asian filmmakers, Zhang Yimou dedicated himself to large outdoor productions and co-authored the media ceremonies of the Beijing OG. But Yimou is also responsible for “Impressions”, a series of no less controversial stagings with stages in emblematic places.
Lhasa, Tibet

The Sino-Demolition of the Roof of the World

Any debate about sovereignty is incidental and a waste of time. Anyone who wants to be dazzled by the purity, affability and exoticism of Tibetan culture should visit the territory as soon as possible. The Han civilizational greed that moves China will soon bury millenary Tibet.
Dali, China

Chinese Style Flash Mob

The time is set and the place is known. When the music starts playing, a crowd follows the choreography harmoniously until time runs out and everyone returns to their lives.
Lhasa, Tibet

When Buddhism Tires of Meditation

It is not only with silence and spiritual retreat that one seeks Nirvana. At the Sera Monastery, the young monks perfect their Buddhist knowledge with lively dialectical confrontations and crackling clapping of hands.
Huang Shan, China

Huang Shan: The Yellow Mountains of the Floating Peaks

The granitic peaks of the floating yellow mountains of Huang Shan, from which acrobat pines sprout, appear in artistic illustrations from China without count. The real scenery, in addition to being remote, remains hidden above the clouds for over 200 days.
Atacama Desert, Chile

Life on the Edges of the Atacama Desert

When you least expect it, the driest place in the world reveals new extraterrestrial scenarios on a frontier between the inhospitable and the welcoming, the sterile and the fertile that the natives are used to crossing.
hippopotami, chobe national park, botswana
Safari
Chobe NP, Botswana

Chobe: A River on the Border of Life with Death

Chobe marks the divide between Botswana and three of its neighboring countries, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Namibia. But its capricious bed has a far more crucial function than this political delimitation.
Annapurna (circuit)
Annapurna Circuit: 5th - Ngawal a BragaNepal

Towards the Nepalese Braga

We spent another morning of glorious weather discovering Ngawal. There is a short journey towards Manang, the main town on the way to the zenith of the Annapurna circuit. We stayed for Braga (Braka). The hamlet would soon prove to be one of its most unforgettable places.
The Little-Big Senglea II
Architecture & Design
Senglea, Malta

An Overcrowded Malta

At the turn of the 8.000th century, Senglea housed 0.2 inhabitants in 2 km3.000, a European record, today, it has “only” XNUMX neighborhood Christians. It is the smallest, most overcrowded and genuine of the Maltese cities.
lagoons and fumaroles, volcanoes, PN tongariro, new zealand
Adventure
Tongariro, New Zealand

The Volcanoes of All Discords

In the late XNUMXth century, an indigenous chief ceded the PN Tongariro volcanoes to the British crown. Today, a significant part of the Maori people claim their mountains of fire from European settlers.
Kente Festival Agotime, Ghana, gold
Ceremonies and Festivities
Kumasi to Kpetoe, Ghana

A Celebration-Trip of the Ghanian Fashion

After some time in the great Ghanaian capital ashanti we crossed the country to the border with Togo. The reasons for this long journey were the kente, a fabric so revered in Ghana that several tribal chiefs dedicate a sumptuous festival to it every year.
Journey in the History of Santa Cruz de La Palma, Canary Islands, Varandas Avenida Marítima
Cities
Santa Cruz de La Palma, Canary Islands

A Journey into the History of Santa Cruz de La Palma

It began as a mere Villa del Apurón. Come the century. XVI, the town had not only overcome its difficulties, it was already the third port city in Europe. Heir to this blessed prosperity, Santa Cruz de La Palma has become one of the most elegant capitals in the Canaries.
Cocoa, Chocolate, Sao Tome Principe, Agua Izé farm
Meal
São Tomé and Principe

Cocoa Roças, Corallo and the Chocolate Factory

At the beginning of the century. In the XNUMXth century, São Tomé and Príncipe generated more cocoa than any other territory. Thanks to the dedication of some entrepreneurs, production survives and the two islands taste like the best chocolate.
Jingkieng Wahsurah, Nongblai Village Roots Bridge, Meghalaya, India
Culture
Meghalaya, India

The Bridges of the Peoples that Create Roots

The unpredictability of rivers in the wettest region on Earth never deterred the Khasi and the Jaintia. Faced with the abundance of trees elastic fig tree in their valleys, these ethnic groups got used to molding their branches and strains. From their time-lost tradition, they have bequeathed hundreds of dazzling root bridges to future generations.
combat arbiter, cockfighting, philippines
Sport
Philippines

When Only Cock Fights Wake Up the Philippines

Banned in much of the First World, cockfighting thrives in the Philippines where they move millions of people and pesos. Despite its eternal problems, it is the sabong that most stimulates the nation.
scarlet summer
Traveling

Valencia to Xativa, Spain (España)

Across Iberia

Leaving aside the modernity of Valencia, we explore the natural and historical settings that the "community" shares with the Mediterranean. The more we travel, the more its bright life seduces us.

Singapore Asian Capital Food, Basmati Bismi
Ethnic
Singapore

The Asian Food Capital

There were 4 ethnic groups in Singapore, each with its own culinary tradition. Added to this was the influence of thousands of immigrants and expatriates on an island with half the area of ​​London. It was the nation with the greatest gastronomic diversity in the Orient.
ice tunnel, black gold route, Valdez, Alaska, USA
Got2Globe Photo Portfolio
Got2Globe Portfolio

Sensations vs Impressions

Maori Haka, Waitangi Treaty Grounds, New Zealand
History
bay of islands, New Zealand

New Zealand's Civilization Core

Waitangi is the key place for independence and the long-standing coexistence of native Maori and British settlers. In the surrounding Bay of Islands, the idyllic marine beauty of the New Zealand antipodes is celebrated, but also the complex and fascinating kiwi nation.
Vanuatu, Cruise in Wala
Islands
Wala, Vanuatu

Cruise ship in Sight, the Fair Settles In

In much of Vanuatu, the days of the population's “good savages” are behind us. In times misunderstood and neglected, money gained value. And when the big ships with tourists arrive off Malekuka, the natives focus on Wala and billing.
Correspondence verification
Winter White
Rovaniemi, Finland

From the Finnish Lapland to the Arctic. A Visit to the Land of Santa

Fed up with waiting for the bearded old man to descend down the chimney, we reverse the story. We took advantage of a trip to Finnish Lapland and passed through its furtive home.
José Saramago in Lanzarote, Canary Islands, Spain, Glorieta de Saramago
Literature
Lanzarote, Canary Islands, Spain (España)

José Saramago's Basalt Raft

In 1993, frustrated by the Portuguese government's disregard for his work “The Gospel According to Jesus Christ”, Saramago moved with his wife Pilar del Río to Lanzarote. Back on this somewhat extraterrestrial Canary Island, we visited his home. And the refuge from the portuguese censorship that haunted the writer.
Las Cuevas, Mendoza, across the Andes, Argentina
Nature
Mendoza, Argentina

From One Side to the Other of the Andes

Departing from Mendoza city, the N7 route gets lost in vineyards, rises to the foot of Mount Aconcagua and crosses the Andes to Chile. Few cross-border stretches reveal the magnificence of this forced ascent
Sheki, Autumn in the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Autumn Homes
Autumn
Sheki, Azerbaijan

autumn in the caucasus

Lost among the snowy mountains that separate Europe from Asia, Sheki is one of Azerbaijan's most iconic towns. Its largely silky history includes periods of great harshness. When we visited it, autumn pastels added color to a peculiar post-Soviet and Muslim life.
Natural Parks
unmissable roads

Great Routes, Great Trips

With pompous names or mere road codes, certain roads run through really sublime scenarios. From Road 66 to the Great Ocean Road, they are all unmissable adventures behind the wheel.
Guardian, Stalin Museum, Gori, Georgia
UNESCO World Heritage
Upplistsikhe e Gori, Georgia

From the Cradle of Georgia to Stalin's Childhood

In the discovery of the Caucasus, we explore Uplistsikhe, a troglodyte city that preceded Georgia. And just 10km away, in Gori, we find the place of the troubled childhood of Joseb Jughashvili, who would become the most famous and tyrant of Soviet leaders.
Heroes Acre Monument, Zimbabwe
Characters
Harare, Zimbabwewe

The Last Rales of Surreal Mugabué

In 2015, Zimbabwe's first lady Grace Mugabe said the 91-year-old president would rule until the age of 100 in a special wheelchair. Shortly thereafter, it began to insinuate itself into his succession. But in recent days, the generals have finally precipitated the removal of Robert Mugabe, who has replaced him with former Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Drums and Tattoos
Beaches
Tahiti, French Polynesia

Tahiti Beyond the Cliché

Neighbors Bora Bora and Maupiti have superior scenery but Tahiti has long been known as paradise and there is more life on the largest and most populous island of French Polynesia, its ancient cultural heart.
Pilgrims at the top, Mount Sinai, Egypt
Religion
Mount Sinai, Egypt

Strength in the Legs, Faith in God

Moses received the Ten Commandments on the summit of Mount Sinai and revealed them to the people of Israel. Today, hundreds of pilgrims climb, every night, the 4000 steps of that painful but mystical ascent.
End of the World Train, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina
On Rails
Ushuaia, Argentina

Last Station: End of the World

Until 1947, the Tren del Fin del Mundo made countless trips for the inmates of the Ushuaia prison to cut firewood. Today, passengers are different, but no other train goes further south.
Saphire Cabin, Purikura, Tokyo, Japan
Society
Tokyo, Japan

Japanese Style Passaport-Type Photography

In the late 80s, two Japanese multinationals already saw conventional photo booths as museum pieces. They turned them into revolutionary machines and Japan surrendered to the Purikura phenomenon.
Fruit sellers, Swarm, Mozambique
Daily life
Enxame Mozambique

Mozambican Fashion Service Area

It is repeated at almost all stops in towns of Mozambique worthy of appearing on maps. The machimbombo (bus) stops and is surrounded by a crowd of eager "businessmen". The products offered can be universal such as water or biscuits or typical of the area. In this region, a few kilometers from Nampula, fruit sales suceeded, in each and every case, quite intense.
Jabula Beach, Kwazulu Natal, South Africa
Wildlife
Saint Lucia, South Africa

An Africa as Wild as Zulu

On the eminence of the coast of Mozambique, the province of KwaZulu-Natal is home to an unexpected South Africa. Deserted beaches full of dunes, vast estuarine swamps and hills covered with fog fill this wild land also bathed by the Indian Ocean. It is shared by the subjects of the always proud Zulu nation and one of the most prolific and diverse fauna on the African continent.
Passengers, scenic flights-Southern Alps, New Zealand
Scenic Flights
Aoraki / Mount Cook, New Zealand

The Aeronautical Conquest of the Southern Alps

In 1955, pilot Harry Wigley created a system for taking off and landing on asphalt or snow. Since then, his company has unveiled, from the air, some of the greatest scenery in Oceania.