Kanas is a must-visit destination for tourism in Xinjiang. It is not only fun but also magical.
The Kanas scenic area is located in the middle section of the Altai Mountains in Xinjiang, on the border with Kazakhstan, Russia, and Mongolia. The scenic area covers more than 10,000 square kilometers and has 55 scenic spots of various sizes, belonging to 33 basic types. It mainly includes the Kanas National Nature Reserve, Kanas National Geological Park, Baihaba National Forest Park, Jiadengyu National Forest Park, Kanas River Valley, Hemu River Valley, Naren Grassland, Hemu Grassland and Hemu Village, Baihaba Village, Kanas Village, and other renowned eight natural landscape areas and three human landscape areas at home and abroad. The main attractions include Kanas Lake, Shenxianwan (Fairy Bay), Moon Bay, Wolongwan (Dragon-lying Bay), and Taiga Forest Corridor.
Kanas Lake
Kanas Lake: It is praised as the "Pure Land on Earth, Fairyland on Earth, and God’s Garden". "Kanas" is a Mongolian word meaning "a beautiful and mysterious place". It is an alpine lake located in the depths of the mountains and dense forests. The lake is surrounded by primitive forests, and its sunny slopes are covered with dense grassland. The lake water comes from the glacier meltwater of Mount Kuitun, Friendship Peak, and other mountains, as well as local precipitation, flowing into Kanas Lake from the surface or underground. The lake is crescent-shaped, 24.5 kilometers long, with an average width of 1.9 kilometers and an average depth of 90 meters. The lake covers an area of approximately 44 square kilometers.
Kanas Lake amidst the sea of clouds
The mysterious Kanas scenic area has many unique features. For example, the deepest part of Kanas Lake is 188 meters, making it a glacial moraine dammed lake in China. It is home to precious tree species such as larches, Korean pines, spruces, firs, and numerous birch forests, making it the only protected distribution area for Siberian flora and fauna in China. It also boasts the only Swiss-style scenery in Asia. Kanas is the only nature reserve in China that borders on four countries, and it is also the birthplace of the Burqin River, a major tributary of the Irtysh River, the only river in China that flows into the Arctic Ocean.
Winter Kanas Lake
The Kanas scenic area consists of extraordinary natural landscapes such as mountains, rivers, forests, lakes, and grasslands. The entire scenic reserve is divided from top to bottom into the glacier and perpetual snow zone, mountain frozen snow zone, alpine meadow zone, and mountain grassland zone, with a vertical distribution. The unique geographical environment has also created Kanas’s four breathtaking wonders: ‘lake monster’, ‘sea of clouds and Buddha’s light’, ‘color-changing lake’, and ‘deadwood dike’. This is also the charm of Kanas Lake. Below, Daniu will introduce them in detail:
Kilometer-long deadwood dike
Kilometer-long deadwood dike
At the entrance to the north end of Kanas Lake, there is a kilometer-long deadwood dike, one of the wonders of Kanas Lake. During floods, the deadwood dike floats up. Logically, this deadwood should float downstream, but for many years, it has strangely floated upstream against the current, stretching across the six bends upstream of Kanas Lake. It is said that someone once threw deadwood into the fifth bend downstream, but the deadwood stubbornly returned to its original place, integrating with the deadwood dike. Legend has it that these deadwood pieces are reluctant to leave because they miss their native soil of Kanas where they once grew.
So what is the real reason? It turns out that during flood seasons, the river carries a large amount of deadwood from upstream into the lake entrance. Due to the strong valley winds encountering the huge mountain to the south of Kanas Lake, the wind direction changes, pushing the floating wood in the lake water upstream against the current. Over time, this gradually accumulates at the lake entrance, forming a special natural landscape of a ‘kilometer-long deadwood dike’ over 100 meters wide and 2 kilometers long, with deadwood crisscrossing. These deadwood pieces float with the rise and fall of the water; this scene of floating upstream against the current is indeed very rare.
"Lake monster"
The famous wonder of Kanas Lake is the legend of the giant ‘lake monster’; as early as 1980, Guangming Daily published a news report about someone witnessing a water monster in Kanas Lake in Xinjiang, causing an uproar nationwide. Since then, news about the ‘lake monster’ has been continuous. In late July 1985, an expedition team led by Professor Xiang Ligai from Xinjiang University’s Zoology Department was working by the lake when they suddenly discovered dozens of giant fish appearing on the lake surface. Two days later, an expedition team led by Yuan Guoying from the Xinjiang Institute of Environmental Sciences also observed giant schools of fish in the lake from the ‘Yilan Pavilion’, and took many photos and a video, thereby beginning research into the mystery of Kanas Lake’s ‘lake monster’.
In June 2004, tourists photographed an unknown object over ten meters long swimming in Kanas Lake; in July 2004, a diving team conducted diving experiments in Kanas Lake, but found danger after diving 20 meters. Most of the lake water is meltwater from ice and snow, close to deep sea temperatures, which is difficult for the human body to bear; by 2012, a CCTV program broadcast a video of Kanas Lake’s water monster causing huge waves, sparking another huge controversy over whether the water monster exists.
In recent years, numerous tourists and scientific researchers have personally observed giant fish from the top of the mountain, swimming in groups and creating waves. Black objects as long as tens of meters slowly swim in the lake, spreading rumors about the ‘lake monster’ and making it sound like a神话, adding a few more mysterious hues to the beautiful Kanas Lake. According to local Tuvinian folklore, there is a huge monster in Kanas Lake that can spray mist and clouds, often devouring cattle, sheep, horses, and other livestock on the shore. Such legends have persisted from ancient times to the present, and to this day, the Tuvinians never fish in the lake or graze livestock near it.
The mystery of Kanas Lake is probably related to the legend of the lake monster. According to the investigations and inferences of some experts, the so-called lake monster is actually those big red fish that like to swim in groups. This is a ‘longevity fish’ that grows in cold, deep lake water and can live for over 200 years, moving mysteriously. However, no one can clearly describe what the lake monster looks like. Kanas Lake is home to rare fish species such as Hucho taimen, Leuciscus waleckii, Lota lota, Huso huso altaicum, and Perca fluviatilis sibirica. Especially the famous Hucho taimen, which can grow to over ten meters in length and weigh several hundred kilograms, is commonly known as the big red fish due to its reddish body. Whether the ‘lake monster’ and the big red fish (Hucho taimen) are the same thing remains a mystery to this day.
"Sea of Clouds and Buddha’s Light"
If you climb to the top of the mountain, the Fish Viewing Pavilion, in the early morning to watch the sunrise, you can see the sea of clouds boiling and mist waves rising above Kanas. Sometimes, you can witness such wonders like the Buddha’s light in the sea of clouds over Mount Emei. Abundant precipitation and cool climate often shroud the Kanas Lake area in hazy fog and hail, while the peaks above the clouds become ideal places to observe the Buddha’s light. In August, whenever the early mornings after rain come, the valleys in the Kanas mountain area are often covered by thick fog and clouds, only revealing peaks above 2000 meters in height.
At this time, if you climb up to the ‘Panoramic Pavilion’ to watch the sunrise, you will see a huge morning sun hanging diagonally in the blue sky above your head, reflecting red light on the distant and nearby snowy peaks. The white sea of clouds below your feet rolls like waves with the wind, sometimes revealing flat, mirror-like blue lake surfaces and sometimes revealing vast green forests. The colorful clouds approaching you, carrying the reflected glow of the sun, display countless ever-changing forms, leaving you with too much to see.
When the sun rises to a certain angle at around 9-10 am, a huge semicircular colorful halo gradually appears in the clouds of the valley on the west side of the lake, which is in the opposite direction of the sun. The halo includes all seven colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and purple, and it is bright and eye-catching, with its lower part disappearing into the clouds. As the clouds change in density, the color of the halo also varies, sometimes deep and sometimes shallow, sometimes bright and sometimes dark. With the colorful halo surrounding and highlighting these peaks, pavilions, and even your own shadow, the scene is vibrant and dazzling, giving people the sensation of gods and buddhas emerging and feeling ethereal. The Buddha’s light can last for about a quarter of an hour and gradually fades away as the sun rises higher and the angle of its light changes, making it unforgettable for a lifetime.
Color-Changing Lake
’Color-Changing Lake’
One of the four wonders of Kanas Lake is its color-changing ability, earning it the name of ‘Color-Changing Lake’. The lake water changes color with changes in the weather and different seasons. Viewing Kanas Lake water under different weather conditions and from different angles will reveal different colors. These colors arise from the special water quality refracting with the sky and mountain colors to produce different hues. Surrounded by mountains and forests, the surrounding mountain colors are reflected in the lake. With changes in sky clouds and the alternating light and dark of the mountain colors under the sun, the lake water changes infinitely and is colorful and radiant.
During spring and summer, the lake water also changes color with the changing seasons. From thawing in April and May each year to freezing over with ice and snow in November, the lake water presents different colors in different seasons. In May, with ice and snow melting, Kanas Lake is dark and grayish-blue. In June, the lake water turns light green or turquoise as the surrounding mountain plants turn green. After July, due to the injection of a large amount of white lake water from upstream White Lake, the lake color changes from turquoise to a milky white with a hint of blue-green. In August, affected by rainfall, the lake water appears dark green. Entering September and October, the water inflow from upstream of the lake significantly decreases. At this time, it is autumn, and the surrounding plants slowly turn golden yellow and red, with colorful hues. The emerald-green lake water is set off even more dazzlingly, captivating the eyes of tourists.
One reason why Kanas Lake changes colors is due to seasonal variations affecting the mineral composition of the upstream river water. It is also related to the reflection of the different colors of the surrounding mountain plants changing with the seasons in the lake, as well as the influence of sunlight angle changes and photosynthesis at different seasons on the lake water.
Mainly, the source of Kanas Lake is the Kanas Glacier on the southern slope of Friendship Peak. When the glacier interacts with the surrounding mountains composed of light-colored granite, the granite blocks carried by the glacier are crushed and ground into fine white powder, which mixes into the ice layer. In the hot summer, the glacier containing this white fine powder melts, and a large amount of milky glacier meltwater and rainwater enter the Kanas River and flow into Akkule Lake (White Lake). The milky water of Akkule Lake then flows downstream and converges into Kanas Lake. This is the reason why Kanas Lake turns white from July to August. After freezing in December each year, Kanas Lake resembles a white crystal mirror. Local herdsmen use sledges to transport goods or engage in skiing and skating on the lake surface, creating a landscape of another color.
After reading this, have you been captivated by the beautiful and magical Kanas?
Xinjiang Tourism Consultation: (Same) 0991-8585456