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Published: November 16th 2010
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This blog will most likely amuse everyone but firstly we will discuss the serious issues I.e the sites!! We visited the Terracotta Warriors on Tuesday, where we got a minibus to. It was impressive, so far only a few thousand warriors have been excavated and work still continues! There were 3 massive warehouses/ showrooms with various warriors,horses and chariots. When we arrived back to the hotel, Carla & Ryan and ourselves rented bicycles and cycled along the Xian City Wall. It was great fun and the weather was lovely. The bicycles were so old I thought mine was going to fall apart whilst cycling! I had a bell and I continued to ring it to get the Chinese to move out of the way!! We reckoned What goes around comes around... That evening we went for famous Chinese Dumplings, had veggie and meat ones...quite nice!!
On Wednesday, we had an early rise as we were heading for the all-day sleeper train. We were on it from around 9am til 12.30am, when we arrived in Yiching. We arrived at the Rest Hotel, exhausted and rolled into bed. Nothing was planned for the following morning so we had a sleep-in and checked
out. We went for brunch with the group...or most of the group and then went to get stocked up in the supermarket for 2days on board the luxurious boat!! Our shopping consisted of 12 croissants, bars, biscuits, instant noodles and fruit!! What a diet! We got a taxi to the docks and jumped on a coach which took us to the boat. We boarded the boat around 8pm.
The boat.....first impressions- I wasn't overly excited but Peter and some others thought it was better than what they expected. Personally, I thought it was old, dirty, our room smelled. The bathroom was small, dirty and the shower was a shower hose on the bathroom floor!! Apparently "it's great for a man Coz they can Pee and Shower at the same time!!" Once we were settled it, we took a walk round, found the bar which was a room with chairs where Chinese people done karaoke! We bought a carryout, setup the iPod in the Aussies room and had some drinks. After waiting for 2 hours, the boat set sail along the Yangtze River. When going to bed I got wrapped up in full protective gear- leggings& knee socks, long-sleeved top
and into my sleeping bag liner! Nothing was going to crawl up my leg!!haha.. So all-in-all, night number one came and went uneventfully and we woke up with spectacular views! The water was green, the sun was shining, we were sailing through what looked like mountains, it was beautiful. The boat docked around 10am and we got off to explore the White Kings Temple. Again the scenery was fabulous! We returned to the boat and when we left we sat on the top deck and seen all the famous gorges and heard the history of the rocks! It was so relaxing. Then we just done or own thing for the evening, went for dinner and had a few drinks in our room! After a great day, it was time for bed and once I was wrapped up we went to sleep. I woke up to what I can describe as squealing, splashing and moving around... It was coming from the bathroom! Oh my god, the rats were in our bathroom! I made Peter get up and as We tried to plan what we would do if rats came out of the bathroom.... So Peter, very bravely went to investigate whilst
I hid in my sleeping bag liner!! Thank god there was nothing in the bathroom! So after Peter convincing me to lie down, I fell asleep around 1.30..... Episode 2 occurred at 3.30, this time the scurrying occurred at our heads! oh my god the rats were in the room. The lights went on, the tears began, to be fair we were both scared! After peter poking around, he figured the rats were out in the gully! When 6.30 came we were so relieved and tired but everyone else had felt the same! Unfortunately we will remember the Yangtze for the rats and not the scenery!
We got a 5 hour bus journey to the train station. Peter had his ordeal here. After almost 2 weeks in China and continuous laughing about my issues with the toilets, nature came knocking. He suggested, theres a McDonalds, bound to be western loo's there!! So he headed off... I waited and when he returned i knew by his face things had not went according to plan.....he had to squat!! He now has full sympathy and will no longer laugh or be cross when we have to go in search of a Starbucks so
I can go to the toilet!!
So then 13 hours on another train to Yangshou.
We arrived at Lisas mountain at 6.10am, had breakfast and a walking tour. Seems nice place in the country.. That's all for now folks
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Siobhan Rooney
non-member comment
Funniest thing
Oh Andrea and Peter, well this blog would not open for me so I asked Priscilla to forward it to me. I am quite literally om stitches laughing. I was reading it out to Peter and I could not get the words out as I was laughing. I am sure none of this was funny at the time but when you read this again in months you will!! Thanks for such a funny story you have brightened up my evening as I am just after finishing auditing files!! Bye Siobhan xxxx