Marco Polo reaches Cathay and meets Kublai Khan

They had a long and difficult odyssey, mostly on horseback, to reach China. The Polos
traveled through Armenia, Persia, and Afghanistan, over the Pamir Mountains, and along
the Silk Road, the main travel route for traders. Marco kept detailed journals, where he
recorded his impressions of the terrain. When he first saw the great Gobi Desert, more
than 500,000 square miles (805,000 km) of sand, he wrote: "This desert is reported to be
so long that it would take a year to go from end to end... There is nothing at all to eat."
The Polos stopped for a year in the Mongol region, where they learned about the lives
and civilization of the people there. When the Polos reached Cathay to stay with the
emperor Kublai Khan, Marco impressed the ruler with his knowledge of Mongol
traditions. The Polos had traveled 5600 miles (9000 km) in over three and a half years to
reach Cathay.

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