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Published: August 6th 2007
The Great Wall of China - Outside Beijing
This is the Mutianyu section of the wall. It was amazing to think how this could have been built so long ago...Xian
Although intially Xian was not that enjoyable things did get better. The Terracotta Warriors were a bit of a let down from what we had both expected. You really can't get close enough to the real ones to appreciate the craftmanship and as a mass, it's a bit too smoggy to be awed by them. It was definately worth going but our tour guide was also a bit lacking in the information area so overall, good but not great. The Muslim Quarter in Xian, however, was pretty special. We had what seems like a Chinese version of Gozleme - a pita bread filled with meat and spices chopped in quarters - for dinner before setting off through the maze of narrow streets with stalls selling everything from shoes and clothes to swords and chops (stamps) and jewellery and "antiques". We filled our bags there. We spent the last day in Xian doing the tourist sites of the city. This included the Bell Tower, Drum Tower and the Big Goose Pagoda. At the Big Goose Pagoda bus loads of tour groups were dropped off there with loud speaker wielding tour guides but we opted for the local bus from the
Temple of Heaven Park
A colourful character performing in the Park around the temple. There was a covered walkway from the temple that was full of musician's doing their thing. South Gate of the city. We were again treated like celebrities by people wanting their photo taken with us (also happened at Xian railway station). It was then off to Beijing.
Beijing
Beijing was another sleeper train away and we again got hard sleeper but we had top and middle in the same compartment - unlike the top 2 we got on the way to Guangzhou in separate compartments. We had spent the time planning our stay so were well prepared for Beijing and grabbed a double room in the first backpacker place we had in mind (Beijing Saga Youth Hostel). We quickly changed and jumped straight on a day trip bus to the Great Wall at Mutianyu, which is apparently the less commercial area according to our 2 year old Lonely Planet. We got a ticket for the cable car up (instead of hikinh up) and the toboggan down, which would have been much better if some panic-stricken lady wasn't riding the brake the whole way down in front of us!! The wall itself was excellent and got better as the day cleared up letting us see more of the wall weaving off into the distance. We
Temple of Heaven - Beijing
This quite interesting Temple was located in the south of Beijing. It was round to signify heaven (earth was square) and the roof was coloured blue as the colour of Heaven hiked to the right at the top of the cable car and got to the rubble after about an hour or so. We also hiked a bit past the "no access" sign where there is still a path but it's amazingly overgrown. It's also amazing how many vendors hike up to the wall and station themselves in a bit of shade in order to offer climbers "watacokorbir?" ("water coke or beer?") Who knows how many beers they actually sell but the water was great once you got them to halve the price. It was frozen in the middle so lasted ages. The tour we got was great too. No tour guide, no shops. Just a minibus driver who got some lady to translate for him and let us all know to meet back at the bottom at 2:45pm.
The next day (Saturday) we got the metro and a local bus to Pangiayuan markets and stocked up before sending a second box home - another 13kg in half the time it took to fill the last one! That night we went to an incredible acrobatics show. Well worth buying the tickets at our Guesthouse for 100Y each including return taxi,
Peking Duck Surgeon
Tasty, Tasty Peking Duck in Beijing... as the tickets at the door started at 180Y each at the back of the room. We were in the 3rd row!! The plate spinners, diablo throwers, unicyclers, pole climbers, hat jugglers, flippers and tumblers were all so amazing! As we had left the city sights to the last minute we didn't want to risk wasting time finding places so we booked a city tour and saw the Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven and the Forbidden City - as well as a silk factory and pearl factory thrown in for good measure. Well worth it though for the information that spilled out of our excellent guide. We leave for Japan tomorrow.
- Lew and Holly
(sent from Japan, a Japan update will follow in the next few days)
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MattJ
non-member comment
Jade
what, no Jade factories? I thought they were all about the Jade in Xian.