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We left Shanghai on Wednesday for the beautiful canal town of Xitang. Here we had the opportunity to stay in a traditional Chinese guest house (four poster bed inculded if you dont mind!) and sample the local rice wine (smelt much worse than it tasted!) After spending a week in the busteling city it was a nice change to visit a relaxed traditional Chinese town.
We then took the night train to Xi-an to visit to the terracotta warriors. The first emperor of china commissioned an army to be built in 210 BC; the sculptures were later buried with him in his tomb to ensure his power in the after-life. In 1974 a farmer (who we met) digging a well came across this astonishing discovery and from then on the warriors have been open for the world to see. Just standing infront of the army you are truly mistafied by the skill of the artists. The soldiers look so life-like I expected one of them to move or blink! Its so mistifying to think that the 1000 or so soilders and calvery that we saw are only 1/8th of what is still to be excavated. The warriors are all a
grey colour, however, each one was individually painted in their family colours, once exposed to the atmospher it takes only 30 minutes for all colour to be completely drained from the terracotta, hence the 7 pits still sealed.
From Xi-an we took another night train to the enchanting town of Pingyao. This has been my favourite stop in China so far. The town is listed as a world heritage site giving you a taste for traditional China before the 1949 communist regime. We arrived into the walled town at 5:30 am and had the cobbled streets pratically to ourselves for some nice photographs. The architecture is beautiful and we also visited many beautiful temples the town has to offer.
On our last day around 2:40pm as we were preparing to depart, the town was struck by an earthquake!
I was drinking tea with some members of the group while Ivan was next door having his back cracked back into place when everything started to shake from side to side! At first I didnt know what was happening or what to do but our group leader screamed earthquake and we all ran outside! The strange shakinging lasted for two
minutes as everone huddled together in the open streets. Ivan remained in the massage parlour only to come out complaining of motion sickness - not realising that the room was moving and it wasn't his imagination! It has been reported that the quake in our provence was around 5 on the rictor scale (7.8 at the epicentre!) thankfully all the buildings in the town have a strong wooden infrastructure which is much more flexible and moved with the quake, so limited damage occured. Unfortunately the death-toll stands at 12,000 around the epicentre.
We are now in Beijing where we will start our 4-hour hike up to the great wall of China. Expect another exciting instalment soon.
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Jase the Ace
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Boom Boom Shake The Room!!!
Alright little sis and Ivan!! Glad to hear you're safe and well!! I too thought i felt the earthquake but it was Nuala and her thunderpants!!! Seriously though, look after each other and i'll see you soon. Lots of love Your big brother!!!!