Xi'an

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So we arrive in Xi'an around 9amlast Tuesday 3rd Nov. We had had the worst nights sleep...after opting for the cheap hard seats which actually weren't that bad, just like normal seats on a coach, but just so difficult to sleep on and the carriage is a lot more busier with locals and lots of people, people were even standing...11 train journey too! We woke up so many times during the night hardly got any sleep, so as soon as we arrived at the hostel we went straight back to bed 😊 The hostel we had booked after someone reccommended it to us, was only 1.88 a night 😊 and it was gorgeous, probably our favourite hostel so far. Had everything you needed,was clean and comfortable and had loads of little courtyards inside.

After a nice nap, re-energising ourselves, we ventured out into the city. Xi'an is much more manageable than Beijing, most of the interesting parts are inside the city walls which are all still completely intact which was quite interesting. We headed for the bell and drum towers, where we managed to get student prices 😊 and inside the bell tower they had a little performance on so that was cool. The views up the towers were really nice but again Xi'an was full of pollution so was quite often really smoggy. From the drum tower we could see a little market area which led into the muslim quarter, so we headed there afterwards and it was manic. Loads of stalls selling all kinds of food, and loads and loads fo suvenir stalls all selling the same things!! Did manage to get some earings for 65p 😊

We were heading to the muslim quater for dinner that night so we didn't wander around too much, got back to the hostel where we bumped into another traveller we had met once all the way back in St Petersburg! Crazy! We hadn't spent that much time with him, just chatted a little at the couchsurfing party, took us all a while to figure out where we knew each other but finally remembered. Also at the hostel was a guy called Rick who we had a met a couple of times already in Mongolia and Beijing! Crazy Stuff!! Nice to see a familiar face though 😊

That night we had a arranged through the help of John, our great Alumni Officer at Keele, to meet with another Keele graduate who was living in Xi'an. Andy, had graduated in 2001 from international relations (same as Ste) and moved to Xi'an shortly after and now lived there and was married to a Chinese lady called Veronica. Andy and I had emailed and they decided to take us to dinner in the Muslim Quarter which was great as we had read this was one of the best places to eat and try some food in Xi'an. They met us at our hostel and took us to this restaurant. The restaurants in the area aren't fancy or decorated amazing or anything, they just do really good food. Of course this restaurant had nothing in English and not even any pictures so Andy and Veronic began to translate some stuff but in the end we decided to let them pick a load of dishes for us to all share and try. Ahh it so yummy!! It was so good, as we would never have got to try some of the food otherwise as we would have never have understood it. We had cold thick noodles in a sesame sauce, which was very tasty, much nicer than they sound. Some fried rice, some sort of beef soup with lots of chopped bread in, meat kebabs, a very very very tasty aubergine dish 😊 and some fried bread type naan thing, a local drink and date and prune juice, also very very tasty. All in all lots of tasty new foods. They insisted on paying for us which was really nice of them, with the food here so cheap we really wouldn't have minded getting the bill 😊 They came back to the hostel which had a bar downstairs which happened to be one of the most popular bars in the city, where lots of locals went not that hostel residents. There was some people playing some live music and Andy and Veronica stayed for a couple of drinks before leaving as they, of course, had work in the morning. Was a really nice evening to chat about Keele, England and lots of other things and to have a bit of a break from all the other backpackers 😊

On Wednesday we had got a little group together to make a trip to the Terracotta Army. The hostel organised a trip but it was a lot cheaper to do it yourself and get the public bus, which itself was a bit of challenge as there are loads of touts there pushing and shoving and trying to get you onto their bus, you feel like you're being conned but in fact they are all the same price and the same bus just different people wanting to fill their busses. We finally got there anyway, just to be welcomed by more touts trying to sell you a guide...they never give up in china!! In the terracotta army there are 3 different pits that they have discovered. Basically for those of you who don't know...the terracotta army was only discovered in 1974 and is now the 8th wonder of the world. A Chinese farmer was digging a well in these mountains when he hit a load of clay, eventually it was all dug up and thousands of clay soldier were discovered, many of them were broken, but after lots of restoration work they have been put back in their proper position. They are about 2000 years old when one of the Chinese emporors built his tomb and arranged for thousands of these clay soldiers to be positioned in front of his tomb, eventually over the years it all got covered up until in was discovered. It is an amazing discovery but the sight itself was a bit of a let down. The 3 pits are like normal buildings that you walk in and then in the middle on the ground are the pits they have dicovered, pits 1 and 2 have just a few soldiers and horses in them and lots of areas with broken figures in still. Pit 1 is the most famour and impressive and has rows and rows or perfectly positioned soldiers and they believe there are 6000 in total!!

That night back in Xi'an we went to this fountain show...ahh it was amazing!!! It is a huge display of fountains in front of Xi'ans most famous pagoda at night and all lit up with various famous pieces of classical music blaring out!! It was soooo impressive, I felt like a little child watching it amazed! Back at the hostel we had quite a late night, quite a few drinks jsut meeting more people talking to randoms and playing yahtzee! Loads of bars in China and dice and a pot on all the tables for you to play.

Next day after going to bed about 3.30am we had abit of a lie in...Ste nursing his hangover 😊 We finally composed ourselves after a maccys lunch 😊 and productively went out and bought our train tickets for our next stop. That afternoon after we were fully energised we hired bikes and cycled around the city walls. Only cost 2 pound each to hire the bikes for 100 minutes. Was amazing going round, could see all over the city and towards the end the sun was setting so got an amazing view 😊 That evening we spent the night in the hostel bar again, playing more games but not drinking so much this time.

Friday we were leaving at 7.30pm that evening, so thought we would go back to the pagoda where we saw the fountain show as its supposed to be pretty nice during the day too. Would have been ok, except we managed to either get the wrong bus, or miss the stop and ended up about 3 miles away, luckily I had a vague idea where we were so after a nice hours stroll we eventually found it. Found a lovely restaurant for lunch with cheap huge portions of rice and noodles. Had a little stroll around the area before heading back to pack up for our journey.

This train was 27 hours long so after learning from our mistakes about the hard seats we paid a bit extra and got hard sleepers which was like 3rd class in the Russian trains with the open carriages. The trains were more pleasant than what we had imagined. People tell you horrible stories of people peeing the train, spitting everywhere (all chinese people spit all the time!! Anywhere and everywhere! Even the women do!) but the train was fine, people smoked at the end of the carriages which was a bit annoying, but not too bad. Slept quite well that night but the next day I began to feel really ill, every muscle in my body really ached, could hardly move my back, head was hurting, had the shivers and just generally felt like rubbish...poor Ste, never ends with me feeling ill!!

Our train evenutally arrived Saturday night in Guilin right in the south of china, the t thing we noticed when we got off the train was the heat 😊 finally some warm air, even with my shivers I could tell it was warm!! We made our way to the hostel and by this point it was gone midnight so just crashed and went straight to bed, hoping a good nights sleep was all I needed to feel better.

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Photos

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The fountain night show

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The sun was sooo red!

Comments

[keles]

Hey!! Good to hear that u r having a good trip!! and good pictures! just u could stop by in spain for the end of ur trip!! ;) hope to hear from u again soon! xxx

[Dan]

Hi Layla and Ste
Those soldiers are pretty amazing, must have taken ages to make all of them! hope your feeling better now, when is your expected return date? you must be loving it! pictures are great! Have fun!!! Dan.x