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Paul - Well hello everyone.
Watched the UEFA Cup final last night which was a disappointment! Middlesborough were pretty awful but probably deserved to equalize at one point. I wouldn’t normally write this in the blog but as Laura isn’t the most interesting person to discuss football with I need to let off some steam!
Anyway got up this morning, pretty early by our standards, 9:45am! For all those at work at 9am - ha-ha! Went downstairs to be greeted by our ever-cheerful hotel manager - called Jim BEAM! Legend! Every morning he tries to sell us a tour down the Yangzi river and every day we tell him no. When we told him we were going to see the Terracotta Army this morning he was going to organize everything for us, taxi, ticket, and other stuff no doubt. We politely declined - but not before getting the info out of him over which bus to take, how long it takes and what time the last bus back is. He’s pretty helpful when he’s not trying to sell us things!!!! He even has rang us up in our room a few times to sell us the bloody tour. What
a man!!!
So we walked to the supermarket and bought our rations for the day for about 1 pound each. It’s ridiculously cheap here. Walked about 100m and hopped on the bus! So far, so simple! Cost about 40pence each, and the tour was going to cost about 10 pounds so I think we saved a fair bit of money there. we were pretty pleased with ourselves. The bus trip was the usual Chinese experience of bad driving and worse roads. Thankfully it only took an hour and we hopped off into the car park!
And from this point on I felt as if I was on a SAGA holiday! Seriously, I have never seen so many flipping tour groups in my life. It was astounding. And every single one of them was over 60!!! It was by far the most Western people I have seen in china; we may as well have been in London it was that bad! Later we deduced that Xi’an and the Army is a popular holiday destination for package tours, as well as a cruise up the Yangzi River and a trip to Beijing. More on the tour groups later, especially Laura
pissing them off!
Strolled up a long path towards a huge mountain on a beautifully sunny day (about 30 degrees) and entered the Terracotta Army. Not before we laughed at the middle aged fatties in the tour groups getting on tour buggies and being driven the strenuous 400m to the site! The Irish guy we went to see the football with (Tom) had recommended we go see the Imax show before we go see the warriors so we did and it was good fun and a nice introduction to the “Eighth Wonder of the World” (or so they kept telling us).
Walked into “Site One”, the first site to be dug up in 1974 after it was discovered by a guy digging a well, and my first impressions was how bizarre it all was. In the middle of a massive aircraft hanger was thousands of life size warriors all arranged in battle formation, not forgetting the seething mass of SAGA people being wheeled around in wheel chairs by Chinese tour guides (the wheel chairs were hired out for the day!!!!!!) Their “disability” being that they were fat and lazy. Classical.
After a lot of photo taking and
reading about the site we left “Site One” and walked over to “Site Two” which was a little smaller but still very impressive. It was hard to believe that these figures were buried two thousand years ago and were never intended to be seen. The guy whose tomb it was all guarding sounded like a maniac! The whole thing took four decades to build and could house as many as 80,000 warriors altogether!!! We saw about 8000!!! I can’t imagine 80,000 in total!!! And we thought Mao’s mausoleum was over the top!
Most of “Site Two” was in ruins because the tomb had been ransacked but I thought it was more interesting because it seemed more “real” than “Site One” which had the warriors all lined up in battle formation (after they had been restored). Rather amusingly Laura managed to really piss off a bunch of SAGA legends when INCONSIDERATLY she went closer to one of the warriors for an inspection, getting in the way of their millionth photo. I mean, how RUDE. We’re there to take photos of the warriors not experience them after all. Dear oh dear! Golly gosh and tea and biscuits and all that jazz. They must have got back on their coach with their little feathers all ruffled.
“Site Three” was similar but had an impressive collection of horses which we liked (I still can’t believe this was all buried under the ground never to be seen) and after this we had our lunch/afternoon snack in the shade overlooking the mountains. It was lovely. Got approached by some Chinese girls who wanted a photo with us, so we said yes and I’m thinking of charging people money for this from now on!
Laura got a cool photo of a woman wearing sexy, practical clothing which will be put up as soon as possible! (Floral leggings and black stilettos, she must have been American!). Walked back to bus and got back to Xi’an about 7pm! A really, really good day! Had tea in the hotel which was about 1 pound each and was delicious! Then talked to our mate JIM BEAM about getting the river cruise. We’re still not buying from him but he gave us some helpful hints. Now we are HOPEFULLY getting it with Caitriona and Brian if all goes to plan! And as long as we get a TV so I can watch the Champions League final, that is number one priority!
Plan for the next few days : Get a train to Chengdu tomorrow at 1pm, arrive in Chengdu at 5am the next day where we catch the tour to Panda reserve centre (largest in the world with the biggest collection of Panda’s and the best breeding centre apparently!!) before we get on the bus to Chongquing in the afternoon! From there we catch the river boat in the evening with Caitriona and Brian if all goes to plan!!!!
Hope everyone is well! Love you all!
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Big Bro
non-member comment
Saga louts
Sounds like those saga louts were our American cousins!! You don't know how jealous I am. Seeing the terra cottas and now Pandas. All I've had to look forward to is Year 11 leaving! Mum is stiil informed of how your doing but I think she might appreciate an email that I can post to her if you get the chance.