Many Beijingers don’t realize just how close the Gobi Desert is to the city. In fact, it’s less than 200km north. Just flying north from Beijing Capital airport will take you in five minutes over the Great Wall of China, easily visible from the aircraft, and in fifteen minutes you are definitely over desert. I’ve been to that area, in the Southern Gobi, the Red Cliffs are there, where the American explorer Roy Chapman found thousands of dinosaur fossils. But the cliffs aside – this is what it looks like 200km north of the center of Beijing.