Blogs from Shanxi, China, Asia - page 26

Nachdem ich mein erstes Ticket nach Datong verfallen lies, ging es nun endlich los. Tageszugfahrt war geplant, so dass ich die Landschaft bewundern konnte. Da die Chinesen ein wenig kleiner sind als wir, ist es mit der Beinfreiheit nicht weit her. Sieben Stunden, eingequetscht neben Kindern, die auf den Boden pinkeln, aus dem Fenster spukenden Leuten, auch Frauen, ist wirklich ein besonderes Erlebenis. Das starren darf ich natuerlich nicht vergessen. Man kommt ja fast von einem anderen Planeten. Dieses Gefuehl wird einem vermittelt, da man permanent angestarrt wird. Am Bahnhof von Datong wurden wir von dem einem Mitarbeiter des staatlichen Reisebueros in Empfang genommen um evtl. ein Hotel zu buchen. Da wir daduch eine Ermaessigung bekommen koennen, nahmen wir diesen Vorschlag gerne an. Auch die Tour fuer den naechsten Tag und die Weiterfahrt nach Pingyao fuer ... read more

Vervoer: In Baotou namen we de bus naar Datong: oa om 7h40 en om 9h20 konden we vertrekken in een kleine bus, die er 6 uur over deed. Hij nam de snelweg en reed rechtstreeks naar het busstation van Jingning, na deze stop werd er regelmatig volk op- en afgelaten. We betaalden 58Y voor ongeveer 420km. We werden afgezet bij het langeafstandsbusstation in Datong, vlakbij het treinstation. In Beijing namen we de bus naar Datong, in het Liuli qiao Busstation. De normale prijs is 81Y, maar op het einde van de oktobervakantieweek kostte het 119Y! We huurden via CITS een klein busje / grote jeep om 7 personen te vervoeren van Datong naar het Hangend Klooster, de Houten Pagode en af te zetten in Wutaishan. We betaalden uiteindelijk 1000Y voor een goede auto, met rustige chauffeur. ... read more

Pingyao is such a great little town! We are enjoying ourselves immensely here. This morning we woke up and pulled back the curtains to see the entire place covered in fog (real fog, not smog). We dressed and headed down to order some breakfast. Our guesthouse is certainly one busy place! There were streams of other travelers coming in with reservations. The owner has a brother who owns another guesthouse 2 buildings down and he sends Chinese guests there (the owner of our guesthouse speaks very very good English, his brother speaks none) and he was taking a lot of guests down there because his place is full! We ordered some dumplings and scrambled eggs and settled down with some tea to watch the commotion. We spoke with a fellow Canadian (Montreal) who was overjoyed to ... read more

The train journey from Datong was surprisingly empty, Faye and I had an entire compartment to ourselves so we slept soundly to our next destination. The only problem was that the train we were on didn’t stop there. We were told in Datong that we would have to leave the train at Taiyuan and then go to the bus station to catch the first bus in the morning to Pingyao. The bus station was a short cab ride away from the train station and we shared it with a couple we met in Datong (Jennifer & Steve) who had the same itinerary as us. We caught the bus to Pingyao (2 hours) and were dropped off just outside the city walls. We later found out that you can easily get a train from Taiyuan to Pingyao ... read more

Sunday September 24, 2006 - Today we arrived in Datong around 7am. We went to the CITS office at the train station - this is the goverment run tourist office - and planned our day. We decided - like so many others on our train - to just do a day tour and leave the same night on a train to Pingyao. We had a couple of hours to kill so I got a breakfast pancake kind of thing on the street and we bought some snacks for the day. Steve work up sniffly and as the day progressed it turned into a cold. Met back with the group at the train station at 9am where they shuffled us all into two vans - there were 29 people in all. We chose the smaller minivan and ... read more