Huaqing Aegean International Hot Springs Resort&Spa Xi'an

... before, so we abandonned ship and hid in the hostel until nightfall.

The next day, armed with knowledge and modesty, we set out again, this time successfully. The Terracotta Warriors are part of the tomb of Qin Shuhaung, the first emperor of China. The actual site was a bit disappointing, since most of it still remains unexcavated, and my audio guide, in classic Chinese fashion, spoke only of the size of the pits, and the ...

... tomorrow, I accidentally read the bit about the city walls and realized that they are 14km long, not 6, which is alright but I would not have walked about quite so much earlier if I had know how long the wall was. Particularly since the last 12kms were pretty much the same as the first 2. As for first impressions of Xian... when the bus drove in, I thought it looked like just about every other provincial capital I have seen in China. Then I saw the walls and just ...

... Chinese will be ready for and dressed for a normal day either at work or for a few hours playing in the park. I could write about my head shaking experiences when I've gone travelling, mountain hiking or whatever with some of my Chinese friends over the past four years but my friend Amy (one of the Fisher girls who I went to Hua Shan with) got it spot on when she wrote the following about her experience on the ...

... with the excellent service. Mind you, while I was writing that note, he seemed dissatisfied with the speed with which the words were jumping off the page of the magazine he was reading. Equilibrium has just been restored, though, as an air stuard has just poured him a glass of orange juice, missed his cup, and poured it into his shirt pocket! I landed... twas foggy with smog at Shanghai and difficult to navigate. Nothing ...

... Thursday night, our group went to the top of Victoria's Peak and it was different at night than the day when Rachel and I had visited a week ago. I have to say that it wasn't the highlight of the trip due to fog blocking the view of the light show. For dinner, we tried to find a restaurant with Cantonese food, but on Victoria Peak meals all started at $120 HK. That was a night that I admit we had to resort to Burger King. The second day of the ...

... are restaurants; while others are stores. But here there is one thing in common: the owners are all Moslems. Moslem Street has a long history. It is said that in olden days, foreign diplomatic envoys and merchants lived here then they married and had children, so gradually the population increased. Today, most ...

... the rock face (a bit like Mt Rushmore), an enormous square, and lots of tourist attractions. What made it weirder was that there were so few people there! We took a cable car over the hills to get a good view of the river, and then after we had eaten some lunch, and watched a man with his flock of trained pigeons that flew according to his whistles (?!) we rode a big slide down the side of the hill (all rather surreal...) before returning on the cable car to ...

... people just standing around with nothing to do except watch the American table eat. What I realized was that a trade off for having high unemployment would be a more people being employed. With that said if more people are employed then there is less money to be distributed unless there is is perfect competition and market forces which I do not think exist to the extent necessary for the whole pie to grow. That would ...

... the language differences, I'd end up dumped somewhere in the country and no way back to Pingyao. :) Hotel tonight is a "traditional guest house", which means it's a courtyard house. The bathroom - well, you can take a shower and sit on the toilet at the same time. And the beds have a 1" padding on it, but the padding is so hard it really doesn't make a difference. Must go for now - post again probably in Beijing.

... sleep in an open cabin with 6 beds in) it wasn't bad! I of course got the top bunk, which gave me about 2 inches of head room when laying down (its a good job im not claustrophobic!) All in all, the 26 hour journey wasnt bad and actually managed to sleep for about 10 hours of it a(you know me!) and whiled away the rest of the time eating the chinese version of pot noodles and playing cards with Andy and Kel. Since ...