"Dunhang oasis town, also known as the City of the sands, was fouded in 111 BC, and became an important stop on the Silk Road. During the Han and Tang dynasties, 206 Bc to 907 AD, it served as a pivotal point of cultural interchange. Now a sleepy, sand blasted desert town with a population of 10,000. I found it a most pleasant place after the long and dreary journey I had just made. I can well imagine how those people travelling the silk route, back in the middle ages, must have felt after crossing all those miles of grey desert." - MH