Wenquan (, i.e. "Warm Springs") is a small settlement in the Qinghai province of

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. Administratively, it is part of

Tanggula Town Tanggulashan (, ), or Dangla Town, is a town in the southwest of Qinghai province, China. It forms the southern exclave of the county-level city of Golmud, in Haixi Mongol and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, partially administrated by Amdo County, ...

, which is an

exclave An enclave is a territory (or a small territory apart of a larger one) that is entirely surrounded by the territory of one other state or entity. Enclaves may also exist within territorial waters. ''Enclave'' is sometimes used improperly to deno ...

of Golmud County-level city,

Haixi Mongol and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture Haixi Mongolian and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (; mn, ᠬᠠᠶᠢᠰᠢ ᠶᠢᠨ ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠲᠥᠪᠡᠳ ᠦᠨᠳᠦᠰᠦᠲᠡᠨ ᠦ ᠥᠪᠡᠷᠲᠡᠭᠡᠨ ᠵᠠᠰᠠᠬᠤ ᠵᠧᠦ; bo, མཚོ་ནུབ་� ...

. Originally constructed in 1955, Wenquan is one of the small settlements serving China National Highway 109 (the main road into Tibet), and, later, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway.

Geography

The settlement is located in the area where the highway and the railway cross the

Tanggula Mountains The Tanggula (Chinese: , p ''Tánggǔlāshān'', or , p ''Tánggǔlāshānmài''), Tangla, Tanglha, or Dangla Mountains (Tibetan: , w ''Gdang La'', z ''Dang La'') are a mountain range in the central part of the Q ...

, the mountain range in the center of the

Qinghai-Tibet Plateau The Tibetan Plateau (, also known as the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau or the Qing–Zang Plateau () or as the Himalayan Plateau in India, is a vast elevated plateau located at the intersection of Central, South and East Asia covering most of the Tib ...

. It is located a few tens of kilometers north of the Tanggula Pass, where the road and the railway enter from Qinghai Province into the Tibetan Autonomous Region. It is one of the highest settlements in the world with residences up to above sea level. Although not really a "city" by any definition, Wenquan is listed in the

Guinness Book of World Records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...

(misspelled as "Wenzhuan") as the world's highest city, with an incorrect elevation of above sea level. Travel books also inflate the size and elevation of this settlement.Buckley, Michael and Strauss, Robert. ''Tibet: a travel survival kit'', pp. 219, 230. (1986) Lonely Planet Publications, Victoria, Australia. . However, National Geographic Magazine (May 2003) gives the highest city distinction to La Rinconada, Peru, which has a much higher population and lies at above sea level. Some 20–30 km to the north of Wenquan, in the same highway/railway corridor, detailed maps (e.g., on Google Maps) show Wenquan Military Station (). According to bicycle tourists who visited the place in 2000, Wenquan, like other settlements in the region, was "small. Just a few buildings." There were indeed warm springs in the area. They described the location, based on their maps, as being "at 4,800+ metres" elevation,Tibet. A journal. August 07, 2000
an elevation confirmed (at 4,850 to 4,870 meters) by

SRTM The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) is an international research effort that obtained digital elevation models on a near-global scale from 56°S to 60°N, to generate the most complete high-resolution digital topographic database of Ea ...

data.

Climate

Wenquan has a tundra climate ( Köppen classification ''ET'') bordering very closely on a

subarctic climate The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of an ocean, ge ...

(Köppen classification ''Dfc''). It has cool summers with some precipitation and cold, dry winters. The yearly precipitation is , which means Wenquan is technically in a desert. Due to its high elevation, there is high diurnal temperature variation.

Geography

Climate

Footnotes

See also