Nobody tells you how nice Kuqa old town is. Just like nobody tells you how nice Gansu is. And that’s fine because I guess if everyone knew, it would be swarming with Chinese. The inaccessible nature of XinJiang puts off most people, the security situation puts off the rest. But for those who want to see a bit of real China before it disappears, Kuqa is a great example of Uyghur life.
The old town in a maze of lanes and so quiet in the morning. In fact I only came across a few people, one of whom was making flatbread in a clay oven in his courtyard with the assistance of three women. Two were in the kitchen, rolling out the bread and then throwing it out of the window to the man who then stretched it over a round wooden block and stuck it to the walls of the oven. After a short time, he would use a metal hook to pluck it out and hurl it onto cardboard for his mother to arrange. When they were cool, they were stacked for sale.
I sat down to watch and couldn’t resist buying one, still warm, it had a slight sweetness which was welcome. I hadn’t paid for breakfast in the hotel fearing it would be local dishes which I couldn’t eat (lamb for eg) so I happy sit and rip pieces off my disk of bread. It was the best 40p I had spent so far.
You cannot possible talk about Kuqa without mentioning the doors all around the old town. Yes, they are mostly battered and need a good clean but they are fantastic colours and I wished I could have looked behind them. Perhaps I would have been disappointed. It’s going to be hard for the interior to live up to the grandeur of the exterior. 
Kuqa is a must for anyone planning a trip to XinJiang. The trouble is, it only really reachable by train from Kashgar or Turpan and it takes a very long time on a train from either of those places (11 and 8 hours respectively).
There are buses which run this route but it’s a very long way to be sitting in a seat and the bus stops at many towns en route. At each of these towns there are identity checks by armed guards who come on the bus. As a foreigner, you’ll probably have to go to register at the police station or at the very least have your passport copied and photo taken. Hence, the train is a lot less hassle.
There are only ID checks at the beginning and end of your journey and the dining carriage, while not offering anything you’ll want to eat, is a comfortable place to sit and read a book and escape your cabin mates.