Zhaosu County 昭苏县

Setting and landscape

The main ridge of the Tianshan closes the basin to the south and blocks hot, dry winds from the southern Xinjiang deserts; the lower Wusun Mountains (乌孙山) lie to the north and the Chadanr Mountains (查旦尔山) to the west. Khan Tengri (汗腾格里峰) in the south-west feeds the Tekes, the largest tributary of the Ili. Chinese Wikipedia notes that Zhaosu is the only county in Xinjiang without desert. The county government gives an average temperature of 4.0°C, describes long winters with "no real summer", and calls Zhaosu a well-known summer retreat.

History

The county government calls Zhaosu the old homeland of the Wusun (乌孙). The Chinese name joins two parts of the old place name Liusumen Lamazhao (六苏门喇嘛昭): "six sumu", or banner companies, and the lama temple, meaning Shengyou Temple (圣佑庙). A Zhaosu administrative bureau was set up in 1938 and the county in 1942. The Kazakh name, Mongolküre, means "place of the Mongol temple".

What to see

The Xiata ancient trail (夏塔古道) runs 120 kilometres across the Tianshan and has long been called a "ladder to heaven" linking the north and south of the range; the county government says the monk Xuanzang (玄奘) passed this way, and the trail area was approved as a national forest park in 2010. The Xiaohongnahai stone figure (小洪纳海石人), the Xiata ancient city (夏塔古城), the Gedeng Mountain victory stele (格登山记功碑) and Shengyou Temple are national protected sites. In midsummer the county's rapeseed fields flower across a million mu; the county government calls Zhaosu the largest spring rapeseed area in Xinjiang, with more than 70 per cent of the region's planting.

Food and local products

This is horse country: the county is known as the "home of the heavenly horse" (中国天马之乡), breeds ceremonial horses and keeps more than 100,000 of them. It is also where the Ili horse, Xinjiang brown cattle and fine-wool sheep were first bred, and it is named China's "home of brown cattle".

Highlights

• Xiata ancient trail 夏塔古道: 120 km route across the Tianshan, approved as a national forest park in 2010.
• Shengyou Temple 圣佑庙: The lama temple behind the county's name; a national protected site.
• Gedeng Mountain victory stele 格登山记功碑: National protected site.
• Xiaohongnahai stone figure 小洪纳海石人: National protected site.
• Rapeseed fields 油菜花: A million mu of spring rapeseed flowering in midsummer.