As mentioned in the previous post, we had two days off and wanted to go somewhere! We decided to go to Xi’an (pronounced “She-ann”) to see the Terracotta Warriors. To say we enjoyed it would be a bit of an understatement – it was amazing!
Our journey began at 0330 on Wednesday morning – whoever invented that time should be shot at dawn (ironically). It’s a silly time to be awake, but we had to do it to maximise our time in Xi’an. We flagged down a taxi and paid the extortion of 300 Yuan (£30) to the airport, which is around 35km away from Yandi Institute. We arrived at the airport in good time and managed to check-in and spend some time wandering around the airport. We were quite hungry so decided to follow a sign marked “FC” in the hope that it meant “Food Court”. We eventually came to the only restaurant in the airport and sat down to have a bite to eat.
It is times like those where I wish that the Chinese served an English breakfast! We didn’t feel like a feast, just something small. Gemma opted for “porridge” and I chose beef noodles after the advice of the waitress. We forgot that the Chinese have big appetites in the morning and were promptly served with cauldrons full of food! It was nice but there was just too much. We paid the small fortune it cost and went in search of our plane.
We found our plane and our seat – the next 90 minutes are slightly fuzzy as we spent most of it sleeping… Although I do remember the flight taking far longer than it should have due to “congestion”. Eventually, we landed and made our way towards the exit only to be mobbed by taxi drivers who were proclaiming their 100 yuan journey was cheaper than the 26 yuan bus. In Xi’an it appears the taxi drivers find you, rather than the other way around! Even if you don’t need a taxi, they’ll find you and tell you that you need a taxi…
Another hour later and we’re in Xi’an itself! Although most of the journey was, again, spent catching up on missed sleep from the night before. We sniffed out some food and then started the hunt for a bus to the Terracotta Army – that was, at first, easier said than done. There were millions of buses but none of them seemed to go in the right direction. Eventually we found a “tourist bus” that was going to the army.
After another 90 minutes on a bus, we arrived at the Warriors! On the walk to the ticket booths we were approached by a tour guide (Peter) who gave us a 2 hour tour of the museum and the warriors for only 150 yuan – but first we had to get to them. We purchased our tickets and then a golf-cart ticket so that we didn’t have to walk the (apparent) 2km to the warriors – although our attempt at being lazy backfired as half-way down the track our golf-buggy broke down and stopped walking… So much for being lazy.
Peter took us to the “history of the museum” and “showcase of bronze chariots” building first to explain the history behind the warriors, the chariots and the tomb. After the brief whistle stop tour of this building we went to the gift shop and the 8-screen cinema to watch a short movie on the warriors. Whilst in the gift shop we purchased a book about the Terracotta Warriors and had them signed by the farmer that discovered them!
From there, we visited the first pit. It was so surreal to think that these figures are 2200 years old… The first pit is allegedly the “command post” as the warriors are facing each other whereas in the other two pits they’re organised in a battle formation facing east – as Emperor Qin wanted protection (in the after life) from his enemies in the east.
We moved on to the second pit which is mostly unexcavated, so there wasn’t much to see other than a few rocks and the occasional head or leg sticking out of the ground. So, on to the pit 1, but only after having our photo taken with our arms around a warrior…
Pit 1 is by far the best pit. It contains 6000 of the 8000 warriors, all in rank in trenches. It’s also the busiest pit so photo opportunities in front of the warriors were hard to come across – unless you wanted a close up of the hairs and freckles on your face with a small amount of terracotta warrior in the background.
Onwards we went! Towards the 2km walk of shops… Peter, our guide, was wonderful but he didn’t understand that once we’d spent 150 yuan on a Terracotta warrior made from the “real” clay, we didn’t wish to purchase anything else! So, we visited every shop between the warriors and the bus to look at Jade bracelets, necklaces, rings and other assorted jewellery, bamboo, food, magnets, keyrings and many other random accessories that would require the removal of limbs to afford! The best part had to be when Peter felt we needed a life-size replica of a Terracotta Warrior for the round price of £200 – the selling point (which we heard several times) was “we’ll even deliver it to your house for you and insure it”. Sorry, what is the other alternative? To carry it under my arm all the way back to Zhuzhou and then to board a plane with it in September? We continued to listen to their constant sales pitches before telling Peter we need to get the bus back to the city – he obliged and pointed us in the right direction before taking our money and disappearing into the distance.
The 80 minute journey was over in no time and then we had a new challenge – finding a taxi that isn’t taken. Whilst doing this and gentleman pulled up in his little motor-trike thing and offered us a life. We declined as the seat could barely hold one person, let alone two and it looked like it was held together with a few match sticks and duct tape. Our search for a taxi wasn’t going overly brilliant and we gave in to the motor-trike man (after a brief bit of negotiating for a good price) and allowed him to take us to the hotel – what had we let ourselves in for? The driver seemed a very happy chappy to have two English folk on the back of his taxi and once he realised people were waving at us, he enjoyed it even more! It’s very easy to feel like royalty in places like this… Anyway, we continued our journey down a few back streets and down the wrong side of the road (as you do) until our driver got bored of the road and wanted to give us a small tour… of the park. So, up onto the pavement we went and round and round the park. Small children, grown adults, the elderly and decrepit and even dogs were sent flying in every direction as we went flying through crowds of people! Our driver was loving it and we were… holding on for dear life! We did actually manage to hit one man that had his iPod in and wasn’t paying any attention to us! Out of the park and onto a street – we’re lost. The taxi driver, in all the excitement, managed to lose his bearing and completely forget where we wanted to go. A quick pointing-and-acting session later and he seems to realise where he’s gone wrong – off we drive! Down a few more back alleys and up a few streets in the wrong direction and we’re a bit closer but the driver still doesn’t know where we are. He decides to drop us off and say “it’s over there somewhere”. Time to hike!
We managed to find the hotel, although we ended up in the restaurant rather than reception! We spent a few minutes wondering if we’re in the right place as the girls at the desk were unable to find our reservation at first – not that it’s hard, as it’s the only one not written in Chinese script! After the reservation was located we were on our way! The hotel room was quite amazing, although it was also a very quick way of burning cash. Many of the usual accessories in the room had a small yellow sticker with “RMB 10″ written on them – this indicated that if you touch it, you buy it! £1 isn’t that much, in reality, but you could’ve quite easily spent £20 on “not-very-expensive-things” really.
A quick ten minute rest and we were off to watch the musical fountain at the Big Goose Pagoda. It speaks for itself really – lots of water, some music and dancing fountains! To get back to the hotel we decided to take another motor-trike, except this one had a cover over the top – but this driver also got lost! Eventually he found his way (after asking his friends) and we were safely back at the hotel. Sleep time!
The following morning we awoke and went to breakfast. Whilst there we met a Canadian bloke named Bill – hi Bill, if you’re reading! After breakfast we went our separate ways and headed back to the Big Goose Pagoda, which was impressive but definitely not worth the amount we paid to climb it! After the quick 1 hour tour of the Big Goose Pagoda, we made tracks towards the Shanxxi History Museum as it was rather wet outdoors.
We arrived at the museum to find that the ticket offices were closed. We decided to do the typical British thing of queuing (a concept that isn’t fully understood over here) and waited 90 minutes to receive our free ticket to the museum. As we were toddling up the stairs to the entrance, Bill happened to appear right next to us! Of all the places we could’ve all gone, we happened to choose the history museum at the same time… Major coincidence there! We spent a short while looking around the museum before saying our (final) goodbyes and heading back into the city to find something to eat. Time was getting on at this point and we only had about 2 hours until we had to catch our coach back to the airport! So, we opted for our favourite restaurant… KFC! It’s quick and simple and meant we still had about 90 minutes to look at a final few things!
After dinner, we decided to pay the Bell and Drum towers a visit. The story goes that many years ago, the Bell Tower was used to signal the start of a day (start of light) and the Drum Tower was used to signal the end of a day (start of dark) although my personal feelings are that you’d never be able to hear the bell or the drum from across the plaza where they were based – let alone elsewhere in the city! This could, however, just be to the noise pollution these days – back when it was just a horse and a cart, it might have been possible.
Our time was running out and we started to make our way to the coach so we could catch our flight. Why can’t catching a plane be like catching a bus? Why can’t we just turn up 5 minutes before it’s due to leave so we don’t have to leave the city 3 hours before we’re due to fly…
On arrival at the airport we heard announcement after announcement after announcement about how flights were delayed or cancelled due to bad weather, air traffic congestion or late passengers. Here’s the departure board after only an hour of waiting for our flight:
We finally got on our flight and departed (only 40 minutes late) and experienced a rather, bumpy, flight home! The weather was deteriorating rather quickly and when we were taking off it was rather hard to see the terminal building due to the fog… Despite the best effort of mother nature to try and prevent us from having to return to the Zhuzhou, she failed and we arrived only 20 minutes late. Martin and Valerie, some of the Chinese volunteers here, had driven to the airport to pick us up! It was so nice to have someone we recognised and know that we didn’t have to worry about anything other than just sleeping and relaxing from now on!
Overall, the trip was definitely needed and well worth the money – even if I was ripped off for a little Terracotta warrior.
