Hong Jing Lou Hotel Pingyao

... cold and lost here. I booked a hostel online that gave clear directions from wutaishan station! However, when it came to arriving at the station it became fairly obvious that my hostel was, in fact, in another province. Doh!! But very, very deceptive hostel ...

... remarkably well and we had a good time exploring the 3 levels of tunnels (built over 1600 years ago to house and hide imperial soldiers) and touring through the quaint village.<br><br>On returning to the guesthouse I plopped myself down on the couch and was completely enthralled by a Chinese soap opera... it was exceedingly dramatic... I understood not a word but loved it all the same!<br><br>That evening I met Liliana from South Africa at ...

... den Kauf einer ziemlich teuren Eintrittskarte. Wir dachten uns dann, wir kaufen nur eine und gehen nacheinander rein, aber irgendwie ist die Rechnung nicht aufgegangen!! <br><br>Ich bin zuerst einmal ein Stueck ueber die Stadtmauer gelaufen und hab dann gedacht, ich geh mal runter um mir eins der anderen Gebaeude anzusehen. Als ich dann wieder auf die Mauer wollte hiess es, ich waere schon oben gewesen, kein neuer Zutritt!! Das gefiel mir jetzt so garnicht und da das ...

... great it was because no matter how it is cut, my hair still looked good. Chuh, in retrospect, this was probably a warning of what was to come. I think I probably lost about 20 centimeters. Mum was pretty patient about listening to me rant about it afterwards. <br><br>The next morning we rescued our shoes, caught a cab to the airport and then flew back to Jinan. Thus ended the Shanxi adventure. Not very relaxing, but whatever... What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, I guess. Or neurotic! <br><br>

... t been completely sliced in two by any angry demons hanging out at the temple and walked across the road and as quick as a flash displayed my City Ticket for another hole punch. What I wasn't ready for was the fact that I hadn't actually entered the city's Confucius Temple, but by mistake had entered the Pingyao Theatre Hall. Hey I now had a City Ticket, the money had been spent and from here on ...

... areas where you can sit on a swinging bamboo seat and chilll out with a cold beer and a book - so relaxing. After breakfast we had a cycle ride around the town. It is a beautiful place, almost like a film set. And as it happens, as we both were cycling round near the town wall, we rode straight into a film shot!! It was some Japanese film being reccorded and we nearly rode straight in front of the camera! I had my Forest top on and ...

... not in millions. It's quiet. Maybe not in the weekends when crowds of Chinese tourists parade through the streets in droves of twenty, thirty people in matching waistcoats or caps, but on Monday I even encountered... dramatic silence... empty streets (and I have photos to prove it). The whole place exudes an atmosphere of not having changed for the past fifty years and shied away from the industrial advances made in the rest of the country. That's ...

... city itself and a one day tour gives you an impression of what the city contains, but if you really want to see it well, I'll say you need at a least 2 days to see everything, incl the walking on the city walls. The food is also almost everywhere similar, but i cant complain about that cause the Shanxi food is just delicious. The 3rd day i went back to Beijing, I arrived late and tired but it was it all worth it.

... but at 120 yuan ($16) per ticket, it wouldn't have been worth it. So instead we satisfied ourselves with just walking the city streets and enjoying the old architecture. Yvonne has also been under the weather a bit, so it was some much needed down time to collect ourselves and kick our feet up, and not feel like we had to rush around. Even though they have done well to preserve the originality of the place, this isn't to say ...

Adam here well we are now in Pingyao but I must finish off Beijing!!! We went to the Summer Palace , which was the emperors palace for guess what? Spending the summer!!! It was really pretty even all frozen up, the lake there which is huge was frozen solid. We could see it was atleast a foot thick in parts where people had smashed through it :D We also went to The Lama Temple, it is the most important lamasary outside of tibet. Once again tons of ...