A sudden change in 2020 made everyone give up going abroad. But it is precisely this that makes us calm down and slowly discover the beauty of our motherland.
China has the most beautiful scenery in the world, as long as you know how to explore it in the right season (different scenery all year round) and at the right time (avoiding crowds). For example, this time, we followed the brand-new Audi Q7 on an exploratory trip to Gansu and Qinghai.
This self-driving route, which took three days and traveled more than 1000 km, turned out to be one of the most popular routes among online celebrities in 2020. The rest is hard for ordinary people to experience, because this kind of driving experience is called "the new Audi Q7 fearless experience season" by Audi.
The so-called "fearless" is difficult to achieve without complete logistics support, SUV with good off-road performance and advanced off-road driving technology.
Go out of Yangguan to the west and cross the Gobi no man's land.
Fly from Shanghai to Dunhuang via Xi 'an, and arrive at this historic city with particularly strong ultraviolet rays in the afternoon. I visited Dunhuang several times, but I don't have time to go to the Mogao Grottoes this time. I suggest you visit the night market at night.
Dunhuang night market is particularly good. As a tourist area, the prices of all kinds of delicious food and souvenirs are very reasonable: roast mutton with red willow branches must be the best. Even the hand-grabbed rice in Xinjiang is exactly the same as what I ate in Kuqa, Xinjiang. But the raisins in Dunhuang are no worse than those produced in Xinjiang, and they are really good and cheap.
"I advise you to drink a glass of wine. There is no reason to leave the Buddhist paradise." The next morning, our motorcade left Dunhuang and set off all the way west along the 2 15 national road.
In addition to the Mogao Grottoes, Dunhuang goes westbound along the 2 15 National Road, passing through the famous "Yangguan Ruins" in the west of Nangong Village in Nanhu Township 1 km, and the 22 caves with the same age as the Mogao Grottoes, which have been preserved to this day. From the national highway, not far away, the Yangguan site of the Han Dynasty is in a forest, and the only green boat is that forest. Looking around, it's all Gobi.
National Highway 2 15 looks like Ma Pingchuan, but the traffic volume is not low, and it is dominated by large trucks. You have to overtake a long line of large trailer trucks quickly before the meeting, which is a great test for vehicle power and driving skills. Fortunately, we are driving a new Audi Q7 with a high-end version. 55TFSI？ Quartet.
The appearance and interior of the new mid-term redesigned Audi Q7 have changed greatly, and the octagonal front air intake grille is very domineering. In fact, the designer just changed the original horizontal grille into vertical grille design, returning to the design elements of the first generation Q7. Coupled with dot-matrix daytime running lights and redesigned headlights, with the chrome-plated lower edge of the front bumper, that domineering feeling began to come back.
It is not only the evolution of appearance and interior, but also the evolution of power system from the initial mechanical supercharging to the new generation turbocharging (the same engine as Porsche Cayenne 3.0). Q7？ 55TFSI？ Quattro's 3.0T? V6 has 48V light hybrid technology.
The output is as high as 250kW(340 HP) and 500Nm, and the acceleration time of 100 km is only 5.9 seconds. You don't need to use sports mode when overtaking, it will be solved when you are comfortable.
But I never imagined that as soon as we left the 2 15 national highway and entered the Gobi, I got stuck in the sand. Then the camera car happily came to film my rescue, and then they got stuck in the sand.
Driving in the desert, quattro is fast and unbreakable.
There is actually a lot of soft sand to cross the black Gobi in Dunhuang. Before entering, we have reduced the tire pressure from 2.5Bar to 1.5Bar according to the teaching material, and the contact area of the tire with insufficient inflation is larger, which can prevent sand trapping. But I didn't expect that the wind was very strong that day, blowing the sand dune surface very loosely, making it easier to get stuck in the car.
So we lowered the air pressure to 0.9 bar again, and then pulled away the motorcade to make sure not to stop too slowly on the soft beach. In fact, Audi Q7 has a very efficient quattro four-wheel drive system, which is characterized by very fast response. When one tire slips, quattro will transfer power to other tires through grip.
The martial arts in the world are fast and unbreakable.
So as long as you use off-road mode (ESP must be turned off) and don't stop when refueling, the tires will gain grip quickly and continuously, allowing Audi Q7 to conquer many seemingly impossible difficult sections.
In the afternoon, we specially drove to the desert where it was very difficult to walk, and found that once we mastered quattro's driving skills, we would never get stuck in the sand again.
Spend the night in Axel, an abandoned oil town with a nine-story demon tower.
On the first night, we lived in Aksai County, the old county seat of Aksai Kazak Autonomous County, located at the junction of Gansu, Qinghai and Xinjiang provinces, only about 100 km away from Dunhuang.
There is no scenery in the county seat, but if you leave the county seat and walk down the 2 15 national road, you will encounter the punch-in point in "Network Celebrity", the shooting place of the film "Nine-story Demon Tower", and a completely abandoned oil town.
In 1950s and 1960s, people discovered Axel Cold Lake, the fourth largest oil field in China, on the edge of Qaidam Basin. Therefore, from 1950s to 1990s, Lenghu Oil Town slowly reached its most prosperous era. At the peak, 30,000 to 50,000 oil factory workers and their families lived here.
But with the exhaustion of oil fields, the oil town finally completed its mission. Pay tribute to the oil workers!
Now, driving straight in from the hidden path beside the 2 15 national road, the oil town has been completely abandoned, almost no house is complete, and the roof has been completely demolished. But in these dilapidated ruins, you can vaguely find the shadow of abandoned dormitories, factories, shops and even trading companies.
to be continued ......
After a short stop in the oil town at noon, the motorcade quickly moved forward and headed for an important destination of our three-day trip-Mars camp.
In the next issue, we will talk about how we cross-country in Mars camp, Danxia landform in Oberliang, Ya Dan, and Chibi with the same landform on the surface of Mars.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.