Mireille and Philippe promised me a beautiful story
during the trip by train along the desert of Taklamakan.

The Taklamakan Desert is a desert of Central Asia, in the
Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China

There is no water in the desert and it was hazardous to cross.
Merchant caravans on the Silk Road would stop for rest at the thriving oasis towns.