Grand Castle Hotel Xi'an

You know it's bad when we dreamed the entire night of our early morning adventure...to Starbucks. In fact we planned most of our morning around having enough time to walk the 7 minutes to the plaza where Starbucks was located. And let me tell you, it was the cutest little Starbucks you ever did see. As it turns out, venti skinny latte is a universal language. It was absolutely the best coffee any of us has ever had. Thank you Starbucks for going international!<br>

... there are bloody touts, you would walk through a few fields and then find a village of maybe 10 old brick houses and some animal pens, as soon as a local saw you they would run over and shout &#8220;hello, hello, bamboo yandi?&#8221; We felt this made the walk less enjoyable but it was also funny to watch them jump to attention when they saw you, then follow you for miles after you say no.<br><br>The other trick they try is to ask if you are walking to Yandi, by ...

... sleep so this is a terrible thing and it is surprising I still like plane travel, given the grumpy and sleepy haze I usually experience it through. I am trying to be stingy (with limited success so far, I think I might have come in right on budget today, but because I knew I was pushing it, I tended to get more tetchy at stall keepers when they tried to charge me the usual tourist tax, which is often double the price I would pay in Jinan) in order to conserve money just ...

... a la seva estratègica situació geogràfica, com per als devots de la cultura xinesa que hi troben una inabastable quantitat de jaciments arqueològics. Jo, a mig camí d'ambdós, he decidit fer-hi una paradeta. El clima no acompanya, així que busco aixopluc en els hangars a on s'allotgen els guerrers de terracota. Impressionant el que arriben a fer alguns emperadors per endur-se el ...

... which has a (surprise) drum in it to signal the same things during the night. From here we headed into the Muslim Quarter and meandered through the gauntlet of souvenir stalls to the Great Mosque, one of the largest mosques in China, which was quite an interesting building as it sort of blended Islamic and Chinese architecture. After this, we headed back to the hostel for some much needed rest. In the immortal words of Looney Tunes, 'That's All Folks!' Chris and Kate

... We then moved on to the circular theatre where they displayed a 360 degree film of Qin's history as well as the discovery of the warriors. The film looked like it was made right after the discovery, very 70's, but overall informative. Also on display are two Bronze chariots and horses that were unearthed a short distance from the site. Next we moved onto Pit 3 which is the ...

... and we were greeted by our new guide, Linda. The weather was warmer than Beijing and was actually getting hot. Since we ate on the plane we weren't hungry and Linda let us check in at the hotel before leaving for our excursion for the afternoon. Our hotel was located inside the city wall of Xi'an. The city wall was started by the Tang Dynasty and completed by the Ming Dynasty to protect the city. The rooms were large and decent. The beds, which ...

... as it was originally found with some of the statues partially destroyed but most completely annihilated when the original roof collapsed on them. After we had finished looking around we went to watch a film about them in the circular theatre but Bruce came in and told us that we had to leave as he had to meet another group. We told him that we could quite easily follow the exit signs by ourselves in 5 minutes time, after the film had finished, and then meet him outside. He said ...

... the city. Xian is a small to medium sized city (by Chinese standards anyway) of about 4 million people. This is the cradle of some of the most powerful Chinese dynasties and hence the most famous archeological sites in China. Although having said that I did not hold out much hope of understanding the history after my short visit given the appalling lack of talent for conveying history ...

... we cringed as we saw the serrated edge of the tin lid start to press into his cheek ...... no problem for his Mum, she pulled the lid a bit more open and gave it back to him. When he had been going for a while and was struggling to get anymore soup, she gave him a spoon. He finished the soup with the soup. The train has a setup different to anything we had ever experienced - the lights stay on bright the entire trip, so that meant from when we left at ...