Khotan and Onwards Towards Bukhara

We have gone through the Desert of Death and have conquered it. We are the conquerors of the 2 worst deserts in the known World. Our prior experiences gave us the knowledge to bring a compass so even the worst sandstorm wouldn't take us off track. We also brought tons of water and food because I did not want to have to eat one of the greatest horses I had even ridden. We reached Khotan, a large and prosperous trading center. Cotton was also a very important crop here. We soon found out that practically the entire city was Muslim and populated by the Turkic Uighur people. Ibn enjoyed talking with the Muslim people and learned of their differing customs. Meanwhile Mark and I got down to business and traded most of our bamboo for cotton. The cotton came quite cheap to us because they had a large surplus. Along with the cotton we were also paid some gold to make up for the inequalities in the trade. We also recalled from Marco Polo's journal that the area around Khotan was, "a province eight days’ journey in extent, which is subject to the Great Khan. The inhabitants all worship Mahomet. It has cities and towns in plenty, of which the most splendid, and the capital of the province, bears the same name as that of the province…It is amply stocked with the means of life. Cotton grows here in plenty. It has vineyards, estates and orchards in plenty. The people live by trade and industry; they are not at all warlike." We were able to observe all the things he had stated ourselves and we were quite interested in the city and the surrounding region. We visited some of the orchards to purchase plenty of fresh fruit for ourselves to take on our journey. We also purchased some wine at the vineyards for our own use and to trade. We resupplied and even found some replacement horses from stationed troops. They sold their heavenly horses to us for some wine and gold as well as our worn out horses. We then left and headed towards the city of Bukhara in Central Asia.