Sunday 1 November 2015
My alarm went off at 07:00 and I got myself up and packed. The train
pulled into Xi’an about 08:15 and we got off and met our new guide Jackie Chan.
He was quite a character!
He told us lots of Chinese history during all our bus
journeys making reference to movies to illustrate his point. Films I can
remember he mentioned were Braveheart, Battle of Britain, Shawshank Redemption,
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Ghost and Titanic. There were probably more! He kept telling what he
called ‘jokes’ but they weren’t always very funny! He was charming, to begin with.
We hopped on a small coach and went to our hotel for breakfast. Luckily
our rooms were ready by the time we had finished eating. Sarah and I had Room
437 and the room was fine, with electricity, hot water, opening windows and a
shower with a tray so the water didn’t cover the entire Bathroom floor: luxury!
We hopped back on the bus and went to the city wall. It’s 13.7km long and 6 of us hired bikes and cycled around it, which took 2.5 hours. It was good fun even though the bikes were pretty clonky.
On top of Xi'an city wall
Spinning prayer wheels on Xi'an city wall
There was a real contrast of old and new
Inside the city wall were much older buildings than those outside
The architecture inside the wall is very different to that on the outside. Inside it is old and dilapidated whereas outside it is modern and high-rise.
Leroy, Sarah, Janine, Kevin, Dean and me on hired bikes on the city wall
We left the wall and, after a short
bus ride, ate lunch in a restaurant. The food was really good and it was
probably one of my favourite meals. We left there about 13:30 and headed for
the Shaanxi History Museum. We had to queue for ages to get in.
A child standing in the queue for the museum was wearing these funky trousers. I really liked the message on them: Curiosity must be kept alive. Life is meant to be lived.
Jackie Chan gives us yet another talk!
It was quite a big museum but with only 3
galleries. There were a few pottery horses like I have at home but obviously
not exactly the same! I wandered around but didn’t find it that interesting
really and the displays weren’t particularly engaging. It probably didn’t help that the museum was
quite dark and we were all tired from a disturbed night’s sleep on the train.
We left there about 16:00 to return to the hotel. During the bus ride
Jackie Chan told us lots of facts about Xi’an. He lives on permanent transmit!
We got to our room about 16:30 and went to sleep for an hour before
getting ready to meet everyone in the foyer at 18:30. We hopped on the little
bus and it took us to a restaurant where we had a rather bizarre meal. Jackie had been raving about this hot pot so we were all curious to see what it would be like.
Hot pot, Chinese style
We were all given individual little cooking pots with burners underneath and the waitresses put plates of uncooked beef, lamb, rice noodles, leaves, potato slices and eggs onto the Lazy Susan and we all had to cook our own food. Apparently it’s called ‘Hot Pot’ and it was pretty bizarre! I didn’t particularly enjoy the food so all round I didn't think it was that great really.
Not a sign you'd see in a UK loo cubicle!
The hotel foyer
Signs in the hotel lift: Please don't slap the door and force it open. No leaning. No playing and jumping. Please don't push the buttons randomly.
We left there about 20:30 and went back to the hotel. I was chilly and
tired so decided to stay in and have a shower and write my blog while Sarah
popped out with some of the group about 21:00. Sarah returned at 21:45 and I
went to bed while she went to one of the others’ rooms. There were some pretty
noisy Chinese people in the room across the corridor from us and they had their
door open so the noise spilled out. This had happened in previous hotels, so I
wonder whether it is customary in China to leave your hotel door open until you
go to bed?!
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