Lop Nur Yardang & Loulan Ruins
On the eastern edge of the Tarim Basin, wind-carved yardang landforms surround the ruins of Loulan, a celebrated oasis kingdom on the ancient Silk Road.
View attraction
Spatial Framework & Civilizational Geography · County-level
Ruo Qiang County
The enigmatic ruins of ancient Loulan Kingdom lie in the Lop Nur salt flats of Ruoqiang, near wild Tibetan antelopes in Altun Mountains.
Regional story
A place shaped through time
The enigmatic ruins of ancient Loulan Kingdom lie in the Lop Nur salt flats of Ruoqiang, near wild Tibetan antelopes in Altun Mountains.
Ruo Qiang County
8 entries
Atlas Attractions
Altun Mountain Yixiekepati Sanctuary
At the heart of one of China's largest high-plateau desert wildernesses, Yixiekepati is a haven for Tibetan antelope, wild yaks and Tibetan wild asses.
View attraction
Whale Lake Alpine Salt Lake in Altun
Shaped like a giant whale, this ice-free plateau lake is half salty and half fresh, a sacred water where black-necked cranes live.
View attraction
Duck Spring High-Altitude Wetland
Year-round springs that never freeze well up from the cold desert at Duck Spring, sustaining tens of thousands of rare plateau hoofed animals.
View attraction
Kumkol High-Altitude Desert & Lakes
Among the world's highest deserts, Kumkol pairs sand dunes with lakes that mirror snowy peaks across a remote plateau wilderness.
View attraction
Loulan Three-Room Site & Stupa
Loulan, capital of one of the thirty-six Western Regions kingdoms, left these earthen office ruins and an old stupa in the Lop desert before mysteriously vanishing.
View attraction
Lop Nur Ear-of-the-Earth Salt Crust Core
Seen from satellites, the Ear of the Earth at Lop Nur is a stunning ring of dried salt crust left behind in the desert.
View attraction
Xiaohe Bronze Age Cemetery Site
Nearly four thousand years old, the Xiaohe cemetery holds boat-shaped coffins marked by wooden posts in the desert and yielded the famed Xiaohe Princess mummy.
View attraction
Related Literature
2Set here1
- Book of the Later Han: Biographies of Ban Chao and Liang QinClassical ProseFan Ye
If you do not enter the tiger's lair, you cannot catch the tiger's cub.
Mentions1
- Records of the Grand Historian: Account of DayuanClassical ProseSima Qian
He kept Qian for more than ten years and gave him a wife, who bore him a son; but Qian held on to Han's staff of office and never lost it.