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Published: June 29th 2008
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(Day 85 on the road)Back from trekking on Hua Shan, the one thing most tourist come to Xi'an for is of course the world famous Terracotta Warriors. I am not quite sure if it really the eighth wonder of the world, as many of the information signs on the actual site wanted us to believe, but it sure was an impressive sight! Just standing in the three pits that are open to visitors and looking at the thousands of warriors and horses that have been standing there for over 2000 years guarding the area and the tomb of the emperor that had the army built left a lasting impression. On the way out however you are routed through a very long stretch of souvenir and food shops/ stalls, which was very tedious and ruined the whole experience a bit. Information for fellow travellers: The site is about 1h outside Xi'an, and there are buses going there from the trainstation every few minutes or so. Also bring your student card if you have one, as the entrance fee is then reduced to 45RMB as opposed to 90RMB for the full-price ticket.
One other thing that was funny at the site was
the bad spelling of all the English signs around explaining the artifacts of the history of it. This is of course the same all over China (and I guess museums in Europe or elsewhere would produce very funny things if they wrote in Chinese characters), but the Terracotta Warriors may be the best known Chinese tourist attraction. Why on earth are they not having the signs and posts spellchecked, even if it was just by one of the many international archaeologist working there? I don't quite get it.
Back in X'ian I spent a further day biking around the city, well, biking on the City Wall to be precise: The center of Xi'an is enclosed by a beautifully restored wall, which can be biked or walked in its entirety. Biking around it takes about an hour and a half, just to give you an idea how long it really is. Together with part of the gang from the Hua Shan hike we also hit the town to celebrate Harriet's birthday on Friday night, and after a short stop at a weird lace called Paramount we ended up at a funky club on East Street called MGM where we danced
the night away. On one of the other nights in Xi'an, Jen and Eric, who actually work in Xi'anteaching English at a local private school, invited us fellow hikers over for dinner, and it was a great evening. It was the first home-cooked meal I have had for almost three months, and it was perfect. So thank you Jen and Eric! I also hope you can make good use of my hat that I forgot at your place actually the third hat that I have lost in as many months.
In Xi'an I also almost lost all my data on my IPOD, which would have been a major disaster. I can replace almost anything of my belongings, including my passport and the MP3-player itself, but if my music and my audiobooks are gone, then this would be no fun at all! It was terrifying to discover the IPOD being completely empty after switching it on: I had caught a virus on my IPOD from one of the PCs at the hostel, and it messed up the database on the IPOD completely. It took me over seven hours to get it back somehow, using various forums and tools that I found on the Internet to recover a messed-up IPOD. In the end, I managed to recover close to 2/3 of my music, with the remaining 1/3 gone forever. Great :-( From now on, I will be much more careful where I connect the IPOD to!
Next stop: Chongqing (Sichuan Province, China).
To view my photos, have a look at
pictures.beiske.com. And to read the full account of my journey, have a look at the complete
book about my trip at Amazon (and most other online book shops).
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Niels
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Auf dem Weg nach Xi'an
Hi Ben, jetzt befindest Du Dich ja auf "meiner" Route durch China ;-) Auf dem Weg von Beijing nach Xi'an unbedingt Ping Yao mitnehmen - die schönste Stadt, die ich auf meiner China Reise gesehen habe. Empfehlung: Harmony Hostel owned by Mr. Lee Gruß Niels