There were also stories of strange music, and voices that called travellers' names again and again. Sometimes travellers walked away from their caravans to follow the voices-and died alone in the middle of nowhere. People now think that this strange music is made by the wind moving through the sand.
After a month of travelling throught the desert, the men arrived safely in Sachow-the City of Sands-now modern-day Dunhuang in China. They were three years into their journey but they still needed to travel further. The Polos then moved to the town of Kanchow and traded there for some months.
But Kublai Khan heard news of the three travellers and he sent his soldiers to find and help them. The soldiers rode for forty days to meet the Polos and them brought them back throught the north of China to Shangdu, the Khan's summer palace.
It was now May 1275, nearly four years since the Polo left Venice. We can imaging that they were all very excited-but perhaps a little worried too. Niccolo and Maffeo once said to Kublai Khan that they would come back with a hundred Christian priests. But they returned with just one person and of course, he was not a priest-he was young Marco Polo.