Home Inn (Xi'an Gaoxin First Road)

... the farmers who actually discovered the fragements of the soldiers. We bought books about terra cotta soldiers (after all, we are teachers!) and the famous farmer signed our book. By 1979, the area had become a museum with excavation pits unearthed to reveal all the soldiers. We were here at the excavation pits---no heat---for about 3-1/2 hours. It was amazing, frigid, but amazing.

After the terra cotta soldiers, we went to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda ...

... 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 ...

... by a tour guide trainee named Audrey. We had a nice chat, and in fact this was just the 'warm up' phase for the tour as she did not join this one. I was picked up by a car with two more visitors and the tour guide ... which means we had a private driver for the tour and a very intense tour guiding service. The other visitors - what a coincidence - have been two girls living in London, one being German, the other one being Austrian. Counted correctly, this sums ...

... with him into the after life. He believed that they would help him when he died. All of the warriors are unique and they came fully equipped and in formation, ready to go. They were buried underground and intentionally forgotten about until a farmer found them by digging a well in the 70's. It was hard to wrap your brain around how many statues there were and how nice they still look. After the warriors we went out to eat with Andy and one of his ...

... of Chinese culture. Waited around for a few more hours then caught our 8-hour train back to Kaifeng. Well, that was my adventure in Xi'an. However, there was a rather note-worthy occurrence in the hostel on the first night that I briefly mentioned as, "Travis ****** on Mike". If you are interested and not TOO queasy this is a rather curious and hilarious tale. NOTE- Pi'an: An Unsolved Mystery The first night we ...

... in the thousands of clay soldiers that would accompany him in the the next life. Not only was it amazing that he had created thousands of lifelife and lifesize warriors but each face was different! And there were cavalrymen, archers, generals, horsemen and more. It was quite a site! The Terra Cotta Warriors and ...

... about this amazing world heritage site from the souvenirs and photographs my father brought back from an official visit to China he undertook whilst with the RAF. As he was with HRH during his visit I am sure they had an excellent guide for their tour; however I doubt the individual who showed them around could rival the formidable Chrystal (sic) who not only wowed us with her excellent knowledge of her country's history, but also of English Literature. After refusing to ...

... has passed them on their way to the bus in the morning that he was still sat drinking beer on his own at 8am!! So despite Ou Yang's assurances that I could just knock on the door of the guesthouse; when I did at 4am there was nothing stirring except their Alsatian dog going berserk...in the end I had to text Nicola who fortunately woke up and woke the woman to let me in...how guilty did I feel. Ou Yang had to sleep in my room too as it turned out her uncle ...

... huge polluted city, which is so international in some ways, big shopping malls with international brands, and McDonalds and KFC on every corner, and then has some great little local and laid back markets. Just round the corner from the hostel we found a great little small booth which was selling duck pancakes (the best I've had) for 2yuan each - about 11p!! Now this i why I'm loving China!!! Headed back to ...

Today we had breakfast in the hostel then went to get a bus to the Big Goose Pagoda. I asked a lady which side of the street we got the bus from, but she was wrong so we had to pay twice for the bus and stay on til' it went right around. The Big Goose Pagoda was at least 2000 years ...