The first time I came into contact with the Nu River was more than ten years ago. At that time, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway had just opened to traffic, and I was still in college. I bought a hard seat on the train to Lhasa in Xining. After passing Amdo, Tibet, the conductor said that the next stop was Nagqu. I didn't hear it clearly, so I repeated it to myself: That song? The Tibetan uncle sitting opposite seemed to understand my doubts. The next stop is Nagqu. Nagqu is a place name. It is a region in Tibet. I asked the Tibetan uncle: Since Nagqu is a region, why is it a small river? Wouldn’t it be better to call it Zangbo? The uncle probably didn't expect the barbarian sitting across from him, he was slightly taken aback, and then asked: Where are you from, young man, and how old are you this year? Then the topic just changed.

In fact, anyone who has studied geography in junior high school should know that there is a large river in southwest China called Nujiang, which flows through Yunnan and then flows into the Andaman Sea of ​​the Indian Ocean from Myanmar. In my country, this river is called Nujiang. After leaving the country, it has a foreign name. It is called the Salween River; but in fact, the Nu River also has two names in China: before the Jiayu Bridge in Tibet, it was called Nagqu, and after the Jiayu Bridge, it was called Nujiang. At that time, I was young and didn’t know much about Tibetan areas, so I didn’t connect the two places of Nujiang and Nagqu (the upper reaches of the Nujiang River are called Nagqu, and there is a prefecture-level city in Tibet called Nagqu; the lower reaches of the Nujiang River are called Nujiang , there is an autonomous prefecture in Yunnan called Nujiang prefecture, a big river named two regions at the same time, this is very rare in China, another example can refer to Jingzhou, Yangzhou), but anyone who has crossed the Qinghai-Tibet line or the Sichuan-Tibet line will have fought with the Nujiang River make friends. In addition to the city of Nagqu on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, there is also a beautiful lake called Cuona Lake, which is next to the railway. I believe most of the friends who have taken the Qinghai-Tibet Railway will have the impression that Cuona Lake is also the upstream lake and water source of the Nujiang River. Conservation.

Later, I got on and off the train from Nagqu Railway Station several times, but apart from the high steps outside the railway station, I don’t remember much about Nagqu, let alone linking it with the Nu River.

Nagqu Railway Station

In 2009, I took the Sichuan-Tibet line for the first time. At that time, I took the Sichuan-Tibet line from Lhasa to Chengdu. The carpool and the vehicle were Land Cruiser 4500. The price was only 700 yuan per person. Before departure, the driver put forward a condition: In case of landslides and mudslides, take the initiative to get out of the car to pick up stones and carts. Our impromptu team of four agreed right away. At that time, the Sichuan-Tibet line was bad. We encountered a mudslide at Tongmai 102. We went down to push the cart barefoot, and the traffic jam on the Tongmai Bridge lasted for half a day. After passing Basu, the driver told us that the front is called Nujiang Seventy-two Road or Nujiang Ninety-Nine Road, but I didn’t see Nujiang at that time, so I asked the driver why it was called Nujiang Seventy without seeing the river. Erdaoguai? The driver said that I don't know, everyone calls it that way anyway, so you just follow along. I was also quite bored that day. I counted how many turns there were from the foot of the mountain. When I reached the viewing platform, I had already counted to more than 300. The driver advised me not to count, it was meaningless. No matter how many crutches you count, its name will not change, so I have to give up. After that, we crossed an iron bridge guarded by armed police. The driver told us that we were not allowed to take pictures here. This is the throat of the Sichuan-Tibet line like Tongmai—the Nu River Bridge. That was the first time I had close contact with the yellow Nu River. Oh, so this is the Nu River.

Today, the natural barriers on the Sichuan-Tibet line have disappeared one by one with the passage of time. We will never encounter the Tongmai-Pailong natural barriers, nor the mudslides at the Tongmai Cemetery, nor The Nu River Bridge guarded by the armed police was nowhere to be seen. However, the Nu River still travels along with the Sichuan-Tibet line, and the 72 turns of the Nu River are still the symbol of the Sichuan-Tibet line.

In 2013, at the invitation of a friend, I went to the so-called eighth road to Tibet: Bingchacha. At that time, Bingchacha had not yet built the road, and the road condition was a mess. Among them, the nearly 100-kilometer section from Bingzhongluo to Chavalong mainly travels along the Nujiang Canyon. At that time, a friend who was traveling with me gave me a popular science: This is a typical hot and dry canyon climate, affected by the tail of the warm and humid air flow in the Indian Ocean. Look at the lush cactus It is the best proof. I remembered what my friend said because of the huge cactus on the roadside. At that time, the speed limit was still manual in Tibet, and the police gave me a manual speed limit strip, allowing me to reach Chavalong, which is 80 kilometers away, in four hours. I said your speed limit is too strict, 20 kilometers per hour, running down is faster than this. Apparently I wasn't the first person he met to say that. He smiled and said: You can run around casually. If you run too fast, tell me that you won't be fined at the next checkpoint. I didn’t think he was joking, so I started running like hell. It turned out that I arrived at the checkpoint in front of Chavalon eight hours later. Me, he hasn't encountered speeding yet, so he didn't bother to check. At that time, Bingchacha Mountain was high and deep, with many falling rocks, near abyss, narrow roads, and easy to trap cars. It was simply synonymous with China's top off-road.

In recent years, the road conditions of Bingchacha have been continuously improved. It is no longer just a world of off-road vehicles. Basically, any car can go to Bingchacha. The sound of the waves on the Nujiang River remained the same, and batch after batch of guests were welcomed and sent off at the first bend of the Nujiang River.

Bingzhongluo - the first bend of the Nu River

Bingchacha road conditions in the past

big quicksand

Picacha a few years ago

In 2018, at the invitation of the local tourism department in Tibet, a group of more than a dozen of us went to the Qamdo area of ​​Tibet to investigate tourist routes. Under the leadership of comrades from the local tourism development committee, we took a route that had not been marked on the map. Before departure, the comrades of the Tourism Development Committee told us worriedly: To be honest, we have not traveled this route, but we just heard from the locals that it should be able to pass through; it was not arranged for you to take this route, but from Ding Qing to Only this route is the closest to Bianba, so you can’t make a detour to Nyingchi or Nagqu; let’s try this. Comrades from Dingqing County sent us to an iron bridge and told us that their mission had been completed. After crossing the Nujiang iron bridge, we will be in Bianba territory. Comrades from Bianba Tourism Bureau are waiting for us on the other side of the bridge. . Only then did I know that the river we walked along for a long time was the Nu River. No wonder it vaguely feels like Bingchacha a few years ago, but the difference is that the road condition of this line is much better than that of Bingchacha a few years ago, and the road is much wider; because the physical distance from the Indian Ocean is even further away, The dry and hot valley here is more obvious, and there is no cactus decoration, but we also found a place on this route that is similar to the big bend of the Nujiang River. If this place is named successfully, then the first bend of the Nujiang River in Bingzhongluo, downstream So what?

With the sudden emergence of Sap Shenshan Scenic Area in Ruxian County, more and more friends are eager to take a shortcut from National Highway 317 to Sap, and Dingqing-Dangdui-Bianba-for example, this route just meets everyone's needs. Travel needs. You can also take a look at the upper reaches of the Nujiang River and see what Bingchacha looked like before.

A bend in the upper reaches of the Nu River

Ding Qing-Bianba

Upper Nu River

In July 2019, my friend said that he had found a new route to Tibet and asked me to go and see it with him. We started from Xining, Qinghai, passed through Gonghe, Yushu, Zaduo, Chadan Townships, crossed the Tanggula Pass, and Nierong County, and arrived in Nagqu, Tibet. When we were approaching Nagqu, we used the car platform to chat casually about Bingchacha a few years ago During the travel experience, I suddenly thought that Nagqu is the upper reaches of the Nu River, and then I stated this fact to them. As a result, there were eight people in the car, and seven of them expressed doubts about my conclusion. It made me doubt myself for a while, did I remember wrongly?

The Nujiang River is such a river. After going around for so long, there will always be its shadow in our off-road routes in Tibetan areas.