On August 20, the 23rd Silk Road Turpan Grape Festival will commence its grand opening in Turpan, a low-lying area in Northwest China's Xinjiang province.

In addition to the festival's two weeks at Turpan, three other cities in the country will also be participating locally, spreading its knowledge and culture. These cities are Beijing, Shanghai and Changsha.

The grape festival this year is "walking out" of its cradle for the first time. From Aug 16-17, it will be hosted in Changsha; from Aug 23-24, in Beijing; and from Aug 30-31, in Shanghai. Previous grape festivals only featured press conferences outside of Xinjiang. But this year, entire spectrums of outsiders will be fully exposed to the freshly-imported grapes right from the mouth of Turpan, according to the Turpan tourism bureau.

There will be 10 tons of grapes at each of these new sites, including 20-30 varieties of grapes.