Chaerhan Salt Lake

Location:

The Chaerhan Salt Lake is located 60 kilometers away from the northern Golmud city, more than 110 kilometers away from the southern Chaidamu.

Characteristic: 

The Chaerhan Salt Lake is the largest salt lake in China. At the same time, it is also one of the most famous interior salt lakes in the world.

Brief Introduction:

The Chaerhan Salt Lake is gone across by the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. The salt lake is more than 160 kilometers long from east to west and 20-40 kilometers wide from south to north. The thickness of the salt lake is 2-20 meters. The salt lake covers an area of 5,800 square kilometers. The elevation of the salt lake is 2,670 meters. There is more than 50 billion tons of sodium chloride in the salt lake. Those sodium chlorides can serve the people in this planet for more than 1,000 years. The salt lake is also famous for the carnallite, which is transparent and cute. In addition, there are also other minerals in the lake such as magnesium, lithium, boron, iodine etc. Among these minerals, the kalium and salt are rich in the lake.

The land surrounding the salt lake is flat. Although it is surrounded by the boundless desert, it has exotic landscapes. On days of gentle breeze and bright sun, the vast surface of the lake looks like a huge precious mirror. It seems that the lake emits rays of silver light with steaming heat. The glittering lake looks like a boundless sea.

In the salt lake, a great many of the Pearl Salt (known as the King of the Salt Lake) are found. The Pearl Salt is as white as the snow and as smooth as the jade. In addition, there are also many Glass Salt(also called the Crystal Salt).Most of the Glass Salt is square. The Glass Salt is as transparent as the glass.

The Glass Salt is yellow, orange, blue, pink. Milk, and so forth when it is unearthed.  

The Chaerhan Salt Lake is located in the desert; the weather is dry and hot. With the long-time sunburn and windburn, as well as the amount of rainfall is lower than that of evaporation; the concentrated brine in the lake gradually crystallizes to salt particle. Usually, the surface of the lake will crystallize to a 1-2 meters high or 3-4 meters high salt cover. The salt cover is exceptionally hard and it has great loading capacity. Cars and trains can run on it. Even the plane can land here. Companies and rooms can also be built on it.  

Now the Qinghai Salt Lake Potash Fertilizer Plant stands on the lake. It is the largest Potash Fertilizer plant in China, which can produce one million ton of potash fertilizer each year. Moreover, there is a Salt Lake Museum in the plant. There are many beautiful salt blooms in all shapes on display. Some of them are like corals, pagodas, flowers and some of them are like constellations, ivories, precious stones. It is so much complimented that it is called blue flowers. It is beyond people’s imagination. When standing in front of them, it feels like you are wandering around the fantasy. 

Transportation: Tourists can rent cars to get to the Chaerhan Salt Lake along the No.215 National Highway.