One of the most famous tourist destinations in Xinjiang region is Kanas Lake. Kanas Lake is fed from the Kanas glacier and is located high in the Altay mountain range near the Russian and Kazakhstan borders.
As part of our trip nutting out our itinerary for a future trip we really wanted to see all there was to see in the region (which goes a long way to explaining how we travelled over 5,000 kilometres seeing all there is to see) landscape photography related and otherwise.
Part and problem with many of the major tourist destinations in China is the tourism infrastructure that is in place catering for the multitude of local tourists who arrive in coaches by the thousands. As we appoached the entrace to the park which contains Kanas lake we were stopped by officials and told we had to board a tourist bus as no private vehicles were allowed past this point.
Some quick talking by our guide, and the two famous Australia photographers continued up to the lake in their own 4WD. Kanas lake has tourist infrastructure akin to ski resorts seen all around the world.
Kanas lake itself is a massive glacier fed lake. Its high mineral content gives it an amazing colour which changes with the seasons, at this time of year it was turquoise. Sheet ice can be seen in parts of the lake even though it was late Spring when we visited. The Kanas River which flows out the lake and weaves its way through the Altay mountains sports the same amazing colours as the lake that feeds it.
With some more fast talking by our guide and some official paperwork we were able to take our 4WD up to the base of the observation area overlooking Kanas Lake. Some 1,500 steps later and we had reached the peak of the ridge line where the observation tower was and we could start heading further out for a place to photograph Kanas Lake at sunset.
Temperatures dropped dramatically, below zero deg C before wind chill factor, as we took our last few frames as the sun disappeared below the horizon.
