Beijing to Xian

We wrapped up our Beijing visit with a visit to the Temple of Heaven. This was the place the emperor would come to prepare himself for festivals and conduct sacrifices. It was a much more peaceful and frankly, enjoyable, visit compared to the Forbidden City. The crowds were a lot less and the temple is surrounded by a large park where people regularly come to play and relax. There were groups playing checkers, card games, shuttlecock, and many other activities. We bought a few shuttlecocks and started playing ourselves. I think everyone appreciated just being able to relax a bit and not tour and sightsee. We spent quite a bit of time in the surrounding park and in some of the large courtyards. After that, we dropped a couple of the families back off at the hotel as only three families (including us) are continuing on to the next few cities. The families we left will meet up with us again in Guilin.

The three families went to the bullet train station to catch the train to Xian (pronounced Shee-ann; population 8 million). It is about a 4 hour train ride travelling at 300 km/hr. I love travelling by train; I find it relaxing and enjoyable to just look out the window and watch the world go by. As we travelled through the area, it was more evidence of how rapidly China is changing. As you’ll see from the picture below, there are high-rise apartment buildings either built or being constructed. This picture was along the way, and it is a scene witnessed all along the way. The landscape looks like something out of a science fiction movie and words cannot do it justice. Later, our guide told us that these apartments are sold before the ground is broken for the building. However, they are only allowed to own the apartment for 70 years. After that, they don’t know what will happen, but the government has already told them that from the day they sign the mortgage, they only have 70 years of ownership.

We arrived in Xian and met our guide, Jessica, who is another very smart and knowledgeable guide. We went out to dinner and then got checked into our hotel and retired for the night. This morning we started at 8:30 am and drove quite a ways across town to the Terracotta Warriors site. This is an active archeological site and it was worth the visit from multiple perspectives. It is a wonder to think what this emperor did to construct all of these warriors and build the army for himself in the afterlife. It is also very impressive and amazing to see the amount of work they’ve done to unearth the warriors and piece them back together. The dig is still ongoing and you can see many of the figures in various stages of being unearthed. Apparently, the workers choose to work during the night because of the crowds and noise during the day.

In regards to food, Xian is known for noodles and dumplings. Today has been a noodle day, with lunch being handmade noodles in soup and with sauce. Tonight is more noodles, but I’m not complaining. Tomorrow we are doing a bicycle ride and going to the Muslim alley and then do a dumpling restaurant. Stay tuned.

An example of the puzzle of putting these figures back together

The tedious work of an archaeological site

Connor playing shuttlecock

Construction as far as the eye can see