#Driving to Meet the Extraordinary# Anduo, Tibet (G109) – Golmud, Qinghai
Route: Anduo – Tuotuo River – Hoh Xil – Golmud. Today's itinerary was the most challenging day of this Volvo Car Shaanxi Owners Club trip. It's the well-known route out of Qinghai; we had entered Tibet via the G318 National Road (Sichuan-Tibet), and today we were to take the G109 National Road (Qinghai-Tibet) exiting Tibet, the Tibet-Qinghai section. Last night it snowed in Anduo. Looking at my teammate's Volvo XC60 (parameters|inquiry), he was full of confidence, but when I looked at my Volvo S60L (parameters|inquiry), I was a bit worried—after all, the ground clearance was low and it was two-wheel drive, which made us quite concerned about today's journey. Seeing the snow by the roadside was really a headache. Fortunately, everything went smoothly; perhaps because the temperature was too high, there was no snow accumulation on the road, which put our minds at ease. But little did we know that the real devil was yet to come. The G109 National Road was simply a nightmare. We traveled over 600 kilometers in almost 14 hours, with an average speed of 50 km/h, making the journey feel endless. Most of the road was washboard roads and undulating surfaces; one misstep could make you “take off.” It was both thrilling and dangerous, with rough sections appearing from time to time, forcing us to move forward cautiously and slowly. The weather added to the trouble—sunny one moment, snowing the next—truly experiencing four seasons in one day, which was quite exhausting. Fortunately, the scenery along the way was not bad—snowy mountains, lakes, Tibetan antelopes, wild donkeys, foxes, etc., which was a feast for the eyes. My Volvo S60L withstood all kinds of tests, bravely moving forward, and with my experience as an old driver, we successfully arrived at tonight's destination, Golmud City. Volvo is definitely my reliable good partner.
The Tuotuo River is located in Tanggula Mountain Town, Golmud City, Qinghai Province, south of the Hoh Xil Mountains. It originates from the Jianggendiru Glacier on the Geladandong Snow Mountain, where it begins as a small stream formed by meltwater from glaciers and ice towers. At this point, the river is only 3 meters wide and about 20 centimeters deep. Then it flows north for over 9 kilometers, gathering meltwater from the Gaqiadirugang Snow Mountain at the foot of Badong Mountain. After passing through a valley about 15 kilometers long, it continues eastward and splits into two small rivers, 4 meters and 6 meters wide. On both sides of these small rivers, there are many dense, web-like streams in the valley. This is the upper reaches of the Tuotuo River. At the exit of this valley, the river valley suddenly deepens, forming a steep canyon about 5 kilometers long and over 20 meters high. After many tributaries converge, the river channel widens, and the intertwined flows form the western source of the Yangtze River—the Tuotuo River. Administratively, the Tuotuo River falls under the jurisdiction of Tanggula Mountain Town (a district of Golmud City).
The Hoh Xil National Nature Reserve is located in the western part of Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, covering a total area of 4.5 million hectares. It is one of the natural reserves with the best-preserved primitive ecological environment in the world at the beginning of the 21st century, and it is also one of the largest, highest-altitude, and most abundant wildlife and plant resource reserves established in China. The Qinghai Hoh Xil National Nature Reserve mainly protects rare wild animals such as Tibetan antelopes, wild yaks, Tibetan wild donkeys, and Tibetan gazelles, as well as plants and their habitats. In November 2014, the application for Qinghai Hoh Xil to be listed as a World Natural Heritage site was initiated.
