Last updated: 7 August 2026
Keketuohai National Mine Park (可可托海国家矿山公园) sits in the same small town as the much better-known Keketuohai National Geopark. It’s a completely different attraction: an old rare-metal mine you tour through on foot, tunnels and all, rather than a hiking gorge. We travelled here on 7 August 2026, a few days after Heavenly Lake near Ürümqi, and the day before our Geopark hike. This post covers the leg most guides skip: the hard-sleeper train out of Ürümqi, the border-area permit stop in Fuyun, and the Mine Park itself, including the Soviet-debt history our guide told us underground.
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Quick Facts: Fuyun and Keketuohai National Mine Park
Keketuohai National Mine Park is a separate attraction from the Keketuohai Geopark, reached via a 6-hour hard-sleeper train from Ürümqi to Fuyun, then a taxi on to Keketuohai town. Entry is 80 CNY (11 USD) adult, with senior tiers at 40 CNY (5.50 USD) for 60-64 and 7 CNY (1 USD) for 65+.
| Detail | Info |
|---|---|
| Location | Keketuohai town, Fuyun County, Altai region, northern Xinjiang |
| Getting there | Hard-sleeper train, Ürümqi to Fuyun (6hrs), then taxi/shared car to Keketuohai (~2hrs) |
| Entry ticket | 80 CNY (11 USD) adult / 40 CNY (5.50 USD) senior 60-64 / 7 CNY (1 USD) senior 65+, includes shuttle bus and guided tunnel tour |
| Hours | Roughly 09:00-20:30 in peak season, 10:00-18:00 in winter |
| Not the same as | Keketuohai National Geopark (different site, different ticket, easy to confuse) |
| Best for | Travellers already covering the wider Fuyun/Altai/Kanas region who want real mining history, not just landscape |
We paid 80 CNY (11 USD) full adult price and 40 CNY (5.50 USD) for the senior ticket on 7 August 2026. Independent research on current ticket pages confirms both figures, plus a lower 65+ tier (7 CNY, 1 USD) we weren’t asked about at the gate but is worth knowing if you’re travelling with older parents.
Getting to Fuyun: The Hard-Sleeper Train from Ürümqi
The train from Ürümqi to Fuyun takes 6 hours, most commonly on a hard-sleeper (硬卧) ticket at around 130 CNY (18 USD) per person. Ürümqi has two train stations, so double-check which one your ticket departs from before booking a taxi.
Getting to the Station
We left our accommodation at 7:15am for a Didi to Ürümqi train station, 24 CNY (3.30 USD). Worth knowing: Ürümqi has two stations, Ürümqi and Ürümqi South. It’s easy to put the wrong one into a ride-booking app. We caught our mistake in the car and fixed it in time. It’s a five-minute problem you can avoid by checking your ticket twice before booking the ride.
On the Train and Into Fuyun
Our 8:15am train to Fuyun Station (富蕴站) took 6 hours, arriving 2pm. We booked hard sleeper (硬卧, yìngwò) at about 130 CNY (18 USD) per person. It’s a firm, thin mattress in an open six-bunk cabin, three bunks stacked on each side. Headroom shrinks the higher up you are. It’s a genuinely different experience to China’s high-speed rail. We’ve written a full breakdown of what to expect and how to book it as a foreigner in our dedicated sleeper train guide.
From Fuyun station, we grabbed a shared car (拼车, pīnchē) into town for 10 CNY (1.40 USD) per person. These share-taxis wait to fill up with more passengers before leaving, so budget a little extra time.
First impression of Fuyun: it’s won “cleanest city in China” for several years running. You can tell why the moment you arrive: wide roads, well kept, flowers and trees everywhere.
The Fuyun Border Permit: What You Actually Need to Know
Foreigners heading further into the Altai border region may need to sort a Border Management Area Permit in person, since you can’t do this online. You may not need this just to visit Keketuohai town itself, but it’s worth checking for your specific route, especially if you’re continuing on toward Kanas.
Getting the Permit in Fuyun
We spent part of the afternoon at the Fuyun county border management office (富蕴边境管理大队) sorting a permit, since we hadn’t arranged one in Ürümqi. They close 2pm to 4pm for an afternoon break. Budget around that if you’re planning the same stop. We arrived at 3:30pm and they’d already started letting people in, but staff didn’t officially clock back in until 4pm.
Do You Actually Need It?
Here’s the nuance worth knowing before you assume you need this. Research into current regulations suggests you mainly need this permit for areas not generally open to foreign visitors. Keketuohai itself is a standard, open scenic area. Our route continued on toward the more border-adjacent Kanas region later in the trip. That’s the more likely reason a permit made sense for us. If your trip is Keketuohai only, check directly with local authorities rather than assuming you need to make this stop. Either way, if you do need it: sort it in Ürümqi before you leave if you can, or budget an afternoon in Fuyun for the office visit and siesta closure.
Worth being clear this is a separate layer on top of general entry rules, not part of them. Our visa-free entry guide covers the standard 30-day visa-free policy most travellers rely on. That policy doesn’t say anything about border-area permits like this one. Qualifying for visa-free entry doesn’t mean every region is automatically open with no extra steps.
Killing Time in Fuyun: Fruit, Lunch, and a Local Halal Restaurant
While waiting for the permit office to reopen, a small street market near the border office is a good spot for fresh fruit and lunch, including a well-regarded local halal restaurant.
We picked up a whole sweet melon (甜瓜, tiánguā) for 5.70 CNY (0.80 USD) from a street vendor. Melon here sells by weight, around 4 CNY/kg. There’s a 4-for-10 CNY deal on offer too, but it’s impractical if you’re about to spend six hours on a train with no fridge in most hotel rooms out here.
Lunch was at 老马拌面王 (Lǎo Mǎ Bànmiàn Wáng), a local halal restaurant on the same street as the small market, 91 CNY (12.50 USD) total for:
| Dish | Price |
|---|---|
| 蒜蓉油麦菜 (garlic romaine lettuce) | 20 CNY (2.80 USD) |
| 木耳炒肉 (wood ear fungus stir-fried with pork) | 35 CNY (4.80 USD) |
| 过油肉拌面 (hand-pulled noodles with meat) | 30 CNY (4.15 USD) |
| 白米饭 (white rice, 2 bowls) | 6 CNY (0.85 USD) |
Fuyun to Keketuohai: Transport Options
Fuyun to Keketuohai takes about 2 hours by shared car (50 CNY/person including a fee) or bus (25 CNY/person). We arranged a private taxi with the driver from the station for 160 CNY total for three people.
Options for the roughly 2-hour trip:
- Private vehicle (拼车): 50 CNY (7 USD) per person, includes a 30 CNY fee
- Bus: 25 CNY (3.50 USD) per person
We kept the contact of our earlier taxi driver and asked if he’d take us on to Keketuohai town directly. He agreed to 160 CNY (22 USD) for the three of us, leaving Fuyun at 4:40pm and arriving Keketuohai at 5:30pm.
Practical tip: all cars in this region run on LPG, which eats into boot space. If you’re travelling with a lot of luggage, try to book a car with a roof rack.
Along the drive, two short stops (about 10 minutes each):
- 可可苏海 (Kěkěsūhǎi): normally a wetland that draws migrating birds, though Xinjiang’s recent drought had it almost completely dried up when we passed.
- 伊雷木湖 (Yileimu Lake): genuinely stunning, and home to what locals generally call “cold water fish” (冷水鱼). Our driver mentioned it drops to -40 to -50°C here in winter.
Where We Stayed in Keketuohai
We stayed at 芮语轻奢 (Ruìyǔ Qīngshē) in Keketuohai town, 600 CNY (83 USD) for 2 nights in a 3-person room, working out to 100 CNY (13.90 USD) per person per night.
It’s a straightforward, well-located base for both the Mine Park and the Geopark the next day, close enough to walk or take a short taxi to either.
Keketuohai National Mine Park: Not the Geopark
Keketuohai National Mine Park (可可托海国家矿山风景区) is a working-history mining site, centred on the No. 3 mine pit and its tunnels, distinct from the hiking-focused Keketuohai National Geopark. Entry is 80 CNY (11 USD) adult, 40 CNY (5.50 USD) for seniors 60-64, and 7 CNY (1 USD) for seniors 65+, with a guided tunnel tour included.
It’s genuinely easy to confuse the two, and online sources conflate them regularly, so it’s worth being explicit: the Geopark is the hiking/gorge/turquoise-river attraction most travel blogs cover. The Mine Park is a different ticketed site built around the actual former mining operation, including a walk-through tunnel tour.
Visiting the Mine Tunnels
We walked to the scenic area at 6:30pm and found it’s about 5-6°C inside the mining tunnels, cold enough that we went back for jackets. A Meituan electric scooter (3 CNY, 0.40 USD total) made the return trip quick. If you don’t bring a jacket, coat rental is typically available near the tunnel entrance for around 20 CNY.
Since we arrived with only about an hour before the 8pm close, we took the park bus up to one of the key tunnels for a roughly 30-minute guided tour in Chinese. The ceiling gets low in places, so guides hand out small red helmets. Mineral samples from the mountain are on display too, with brief English descriptions, useful if you don’t read Chinese.
Gear we used: staying warm and steady underground
The tunnel’s 5-6°C drop caught us out, and the ground inside is uneven, wet in places, and low-ceilinged. Two things from our own kit that earned their space:
mont-bell Therarap Jacket: packs down small enough to carry all day on the off-chance you need it, which is exactly what happened here.
Columbia Newton Ridge Plus II Waterproof Hiking Boots: waterproof and grippy enough for the damp, uneven tunnel floor without being overkill for the rest of the day’s walking.
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The Soviet-Debt History Behind Keketuohai’s Mines
Our guide told us that during the Korean War, China borrowed heavily from the USSR, and when the USSR later demanded early repayment, China repaid using rare-metal minerals mined here rather than risk deepening food shortages at home. Published accounts confirm the core of this story, though some specific numbers (workforce size, exact debt percentage) vary widely by source.
Here’s what our guide told us on the tunnel tour, and what we could actually verify afterwards:
- Confirmed: China owed the USSR roughly 1.4 billion new rubles (about 5.29 billion CNY), largely tied to Korean War-era military supplies. The USSR pushed for early repayment during a period of serious domestic food shortage. China’s government chose to export rare-metal minerals instead, specifically to avoid straining grain supplies further. These included lithium, beryllium, tantalum and niobium, all mined at Keketuohai’s No. 3 mine. China repaid the debt in full, a year ahead of schedule, by 1964.
- Told to us, not independently confirmed: our guide put the peak workforce at around 40,000 people, including women and children who sorted minerals outside the tunnels. Published Chinese-language sources we checked afterwards mostly describe “a few thousand” workers instead. Only looser popular accounts use a “tens of thousands” figure. We’re passing on the guide’s number as what he told us on-site, not as a verified historical fact.
- Also disputed: how much of China’s total Soviet debt these mines actually covered. Specialist metals-industry sources put it around 9%. Popular retellings, including versions we heard locally, claim closer to 40-47%. We couldn’t find a source authoritative enough to pick a side. Take any specific percentage you hear on a Keketuohai tour as the local telling of the story, not a settled figure.
Why the Mine Still Matters Locally
At its peak, this was still a serious operation, reportedly extracting minerals that later fed into China’s own nuclear and satellite programs. Locally, people still speak highly of the mine’s role in helping the country recover economically.
Dinner in Keketuohai
Dinner after a long day of travel was simple and solid: stir-fried greens, rice, and a clear stewed lamb soup with dipping spices, 124 CNY (17 USD) total.
We ate at 宝宝美食饭店 (Bǎobǎo Měishí Fàndiàn):
| Dish | Price |
|---|---|
| 素炒青菜 (stir-fried greens) | 25 CNY (3.50 USD) |
| 白米饭 (white rice, 3 bowls) | 9 CNY (1.25 USD) |
| 清炖羊汤 (clear stewed lamb soup) | 90 CNY (12.50 USD) |
Before heading out the next day, we also picked up 77 CNY (10.50 USD) of snacks: biscuits, bread, rice crackers, and wasabi peas. The restaurant owner also helped with the next day’s transport to the National Mine Park. Most visitors here either self-drive or come with a tour, so independent local drivers can be hard to find. She helped line one up for us: 30 CNY (4.20 USD) one way for the three of us.
Practical tip: if a restaurant here says it opens at 7am, don’t expect food ready to order until about 20 minutes later. Xinjiang time runs a little slower than the clock suggests.
Fuyun and Keketuohai National Mine Park FAQ
Is Keketuohai National Mine Park the same as Keketuohai National Geopark?
No. They’re two separate, separately ticketed attractions in the same town. The Mine Park centres on the former No. 3 mine and its tunnels; the Geopark is the hiking and gorge-focused site most travel content actually covers. Don’t buy a ticket for one expecting the other.
How much does entry to Keketuohai National Mine Park cost?
We paid 80 CNY (11 USD) for a full adult ticket and 40 CNY (5.50 USD) for a senior ticket (60-64) on 7 August 2026. Independent research also confirms a lower 7 CNY (1 USD) tier for seniors 65+.
Do foreigners need a border permit to visit Keketuohai?
Not necessarily just for Keketuohai itself, based on our research after the fact. You mainly need this permit for zones not generally open to foreign visitors, and Keketuohai is a standard open scenic area. It’s more likely to matter if your route continues toward more border-adjacent areas like Kanas, so check for your specific itinerary rather than assuming you need it.
What’s the hard-sleeper train from Ürümqi to Fuyun like?
It’s a 6-hour journey in an open six-bunk cabin (three bunks stacked each side), around 130 CNY (18 USD) per person for a firm, thin mattress. See our dedicated sleeper train guide for the full booking and comfort breakdown.
How do I get from Fuyun to Keketuohai?
By shared car (拼车, about 50 CNY/7 USD per person) or bus (25 CNY/3.50 USD per person), roughly a 2-hour trip. We arranged a private taxi directly with our station driver for 160 CNY (22 USD) total for three people.
How do I hire a local driver in this region if I don’t speak Chinese?
This is a real gap for independent travellers here. There’s no ride-hailing option in these small towns the way there is in bigger cities. Our approach: kept the phone contact of a taxi driver from an earlier trip, and asked a restaurant owner to help line up a local driver for the next day. It worked well both times. Asking locally, through your accommodation or wherever you eat, is genuinely the most reliable method in towns this size.
Have a question about the Fuyun to Keketuohai leg this guide missed? Drop it in the comments below for a reply.
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