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Published: June 11th 2008
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Not much room
Our beds weren't really that big, but surprisingly I got plenty of sleep on this. We arrived at Xī’ān at around 6:30am in the end I think. Everyone was up early anyway, as it was light outside early in the morning, and you have all the noise of the other passengers and everything too. It didn’t take long to get ready. It’s always a mad rush getting off the train, as it only stops for a few minutes, and obviously we all had our awkward rucksacks to load onto ourselves, so we were ready for a while before we actually stopped.
We left the station, and then walked to our hotel, which was only a five- or ten-minute walk. It was again very busy out on the streets already, and we all got our now customary looks from the locals. The hotel we were staying at was called Guan Zhong Hotel. It was a 10-minute walk from there to the centre of Xī’ān. Our hotel was quite nice, but the only problem was we had no warm water in our room, so we had to have cold showers. Everyone else had nice, warm water, so we were a little frustrated, but hey-ho! We had ‘breakfast’ down in the hotel. Oh why didn’t we learn our
lesson from Běijīng? This time we had the nice experience of pickles at breakfast, as well as the usual ‘buffet-type’ weird foods. Lovely! I just don’t think I can ever get used to those hotel ‘breakfasts’. Very strange.
We all met up outside the hotel a bit later, for our orientation tour. We walked down Dong Dajie, which was the road that led to the Bell Tower. Xī’ān is a very important city in China’s history. Originally known as Cháng’ān, the area was known as the capital for a number of dynasties, starting off with the Zhou dynasty, back in the 1tth century BC. Cháng’ān was a thriving city, and was the start and finish of the famous Silk Road, with a swirl of colours, lute music and desert dust, as camel caravans offloaded and loaded their goods from and to the Eurasian continents. However, the city declined in popularity during the rebellions of the Ting dynasty, and by the 10th century, Cháng’ān was no more.
We walked to the Bell Tower and from there down Nan Dajie to the South Gate of the city wall. From here we were able to do what we wanted. I was
Arriving at Xī’ān at 6:30am
Hence the blurry picture! :o) quite up for doing the cycle ride around the wall, but only Erlend and Elli wanted to do that, so I tagged along with them, whilst the others went off to do some shopping or relaxing. It was again another hot day, and the sun seemed especially strong here.
So we made our way to the wall, and found the cycle place. The perimeter of the walls is 14km, and they are around 12m high, and are up to 18m thick at the base. The city walls were built during the Ming dynasty, back in 1370, and are one of the few city walls left still standing.
We had a leisurely ride around the walls, stopping for photos, and water, every now and then, and it was just nice to have a nice cool breeze too. We all enjoyed the ride round, which took a little over an hour. However, on finishing we found ourselves very hungry.
From the wall we decided to head to the Muslim Quarter to find some lunch. This was where we’d be able to find a nice lunch, but when we got there, the food that was there, didn’t seem to be
that appetising. Well the food was, but what put us off was the whole food preparation and cleanliness aspect. We couldn’t eat there at all. So now we were hot, tired and hungry.
We walked back to Dong Dajie, and found a nice place that sold dumplings. Now they were lovely. I can’t remember what ones I ordered, but one definitely had pork and one seemed a vegetable one. They were lovely and piping hot, but cooled down quickly enough. They were also surprisingly filling. So from here, we, well it was mostly Erlend, just wanted a nice cool beer. I could understand him too, so we went to the “bar street” (the name escapes me!). On arrival, pretty much nowhere was open, except for a nice place called “Coffee and Bar”, so we went in there.
This place was a lovely little surprise. Cool, and welcoming, and the Tsing Tao at 10 yen a bottle (12 yen is pretty much one English pound) certainly helped. We had a nice couple of cold ones, before we headed back to the hotel.
Tonight, we were heading out to a dumpling banquet so we had to be ready for
Xī’ān city wall
First stop of our cycling trip that.
Every met back up outside the hotel, after getting changed, and then we were walking to our banquet. Now this was a lovely meal. We had mini dumplings brought out, with all different fillings. They were gorgeous, they really were.
The meal finished after twenty or so different types of dumplings, and by then we were all stuffed.
From here, we decided to all head over to the “bar street” once more. There would surely be heaps more places open by the time we got there. Well, we found a nice place halfway down with outside tables, so we plumped for this one, and proceeded in trying to drink the place dry of cold bottles of Tsing Tao. After a while though some of the others were getting tired, so we headed back towards the hotel.
The night was still young for Dan and I, and Steph and Ros too, so we decided we’d do a club. We went to MGM, which we’d passed earlier on our walk to the banquet. There was no entry cost, we walked straight in, but we were searched beforehand.
From the moment we went in, I loved the music.
Xī’ān city wall
The end is not in sight... It was definitely European dance. We got some drinks, and soaked up the atmosphere. There were armed guards in the club, and no photos were allowed in there for some reason. But we weren’t going to let it ruin our night, so we went to the dancefloor and had some fun. We seemed to be the only Westerners in the club, but no-one really stared, which was a nice change, and the DJ playing that night also pleased us when he mixed up Queen’s ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ into his mix. Perhaps he knew I was a fan.
After a while we got moved, as we shouldn’t have had bottles whilst on the floor, but they were OK about it. They just ushered us to one of the tables, and we spent the rest of our time there, digging the music and having a good old chat.
All four of us were really enjoying our time at the place, but we decided to call it a night eventually, and headed off to get something to eat before we went back to the hotel. Some little kid harassed us to buy roses for the ladies, but we just ignored
them. I’m sure the girls weren’t too disappointed not to have a, tatty, tired-looking, little rose that would barely have lasted the night, bought for them. Food was much more important to us all, so we found a McDonald’s back down near the Bell Tower. Then we got a cab back. Yes a cab for only a ten-minute walk of a journey. Ros, I think we should’ve walked it, unlike the other two.
Still, we all got back to the hotel safe and sound, and enjoyed a good night’s sleep. It had been a memorable day for so many experiences.
MGM Club:
http://www.xs2china.nl/en/cityguide/china/xian/clubs/mgm.792.html
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