Flat Seth in China-Days 7+8

Asia » China
June 17th 2011

Published: June 17th 2011

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Flat Seth

The Big Wild Goose Pagoda

Just as impressive to see it in the day.

Well –my time in China was nearly coming to an end and I was sort of happy – as Jeff had been dragging me around sightseeing at a very fast and furious pace. My third day in Xian was spent back at The Big Wild Goose Pagoda as I wanted to see it again through the day and climb the big pagoda in order to get a good view over the city. Luckily it wasn’t too far away from where I was staying – but it was a bit scary catching a local bus that had no directions in English and hardly no-one spoke English. It was a good way for me to learn though. I made sure that before I left the hostel, I had the name and direction of where I wanted to go written in chinese-which made life a lot easier for me when I checked with the locals if I was headed in the correct direction.

After visiting the pagoda I made my way to the ancient city wall of Xian. In ancient times city walls were built around major cities of importance in order to protect them from attack. It is one of the largest

The Big Wild Goose Pagoda

One of the Security Guards having a bit of a nap !! Just what I felt like at this stage - after Jeff had taken me walking for hours on end for the last 8 days!

and most complete city walls in all of China. Unfortunately a lot of the city walls (especially in Beijing ) were torn down to make room for modern roads and buildings. The city wall in Xian is approximately 8.5 miles long and usually takes 3-4 hrs to walk around. Jeff didn’t feel like walking around the whole wall so we walked from the South Gate to the East Gate which took us about 1.5 hrs. It’s amazing how the top of the wall is as wide as a road with 2-3 lanes. Obviously there isn’t any road traffic but a lot of people do ride around the wall on their bicycles or motorised tourist buggy. The entire inner city is encircled by this wall – and is around 650 years old. At one stage Xian was the largest city in the world.

I quickly made my way from the Eastern Gate to the centre of the city which is where The Bell Tower is situated. It was also a place which protected the city in case of enemy attack. In the same area and only a few minutes away is The Drum Tower. The sister towers are very similar

Road Signs

Lucky that main tourist sights were also written with English directions - or else we would have never found our way around.

but obviously one holds bells (which signalled the new morning) and the other holds drums (which were used in times of emergency and to signal the end of the day). The Bell Tower is in the middle of the city centre and is now in a roundabout with busy traffic going around it continuously. Just behind the Drum Tower is the Muslim Quarter– which is where a large part of the chinese muslim population ended up and still live and have businesses. The area is also famous for its daily market and tasty snacks and food.
I had one more stop in China and decided to take a short one hour flight to the western city of Chengdu. I could of also got the train but it was at least 12 hrs and cost only a little cheaper than a flight. But as my flight didn’t leave Xian until 11pm – I didn’t get to bed until about 2am! I was very tired to say the least.

Additional photos below

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