Xi'an an ancient city, a unique culture.
Day 1 xi'an
We started our journey with a 17 hour train ride that left Tuesday afternoon from Zhenjiang. We did not arrive in Xi'an until 4 am the next morning. As most of you know... I ALWAYS get lost... like literally always. Just ask Jill or my mom or sister... they often have had to get me out of messes where I have been extremely lost. Xi'an was no exception... the only difference was I was helping lead 8 girls in a country where we can't speak the language.
We got in so late/early and we were all walking around like zombies searching for our hotel. It was nearby, but we didn't know exactly where nearby. The taxi drivers kept looking at our address and pointing. They would shake their head and drive away. We were all so tired we didn't care if it was three feet away, but the taxi's refused to take advantage of the poor, white, American girls... so we wandered around for another hour. We stopped in at every hotel we passed. Half tried to point us in the right direction (though most could not speak to us in English) the other half had noooo idea where the hotel was despite the address being in Chinese. We finally found it after much walking around in circles, pantomiming to hotel people, and yelling at the taxi drivers for not just driving us.
Once at the hotel we found our room was not available yet. They were kind enough to let us sleep in their small lobby area. You can imagine everyone's surprise at seeing 8 American girls sleeping on the floor and all the couches. :) Marie was awake through it and said it was funny to watch people's reactions. Even in the US it would have been funny to see all of us spread out everywhere. We were all so tired we didn't care at all... except when we occasionally woke up to a strange man or woman staring at us, but even then we would just turn over and fall back asleep. We finally got into our rooms a few hours later (around 8 am).
We decided we shouldn't start our first day in Xi'an without a little sleep, so we slept and showered before leaving for Tang Paradise around 11.
We got in so late/early and we were all walking around like zombies searching for our hotel. It was nearby, but we didn't know exactly where nearby. The taxi drivers kept looking at our address and pointing. They would shake their head and drive away. We were all so tired we didn't care if it was three feet away, but the taxi's refused to take advantage of the poor, white, American girls... so we wandered around for another hour. We stopped in at every hotel we passed. Half tried to point us in the right direction (though most could not speak to us in English) the other half had noooo idea where the hotel was despite the address being in Chinese. We finally found it after much walking around in circles, pantomiming to hotel people, and yelling at the taxi drivers for not just driving us.
Once at the hotel we found our room was not available yet. They were kind enough to let us sleep in their small lobby area. You can imagine everyone's surprise at seeing 8 American girls sleeping on the floor and all the couches. :) Marie was awake through it and said it was funny to watch people's reactions. Even in the US it would have been funny to see all of us spread out everywhere. We were all so tired we didn't care at all... except when we occasionally woke up to a strange man or woman staring at us, but even then we would just turn over and fall back asleep. We finally got into our rooms a few hours later (around 8 am).
We decided we shouldn't start our first day in Xi'an without a little sleep, so we slept and showered before leaving for Tang Paradise around 11.
Tang Paradise: Where Disney meets Tang Dynasty
These are just some pictures we took right outside the gates. We were all a little jet lagged but we were so excited it didn't matter. We even got a xue sheng (student) discount on our tickets!
I RODE A CAMEL!!!!
Slideshow below shows some random highlights from Tang Paradise.
|
The pictures below show some beautiful night pictures. They put on a really cool water show. It was amazing. It had lights, sounds, and water of course :) It told a story of an evil witch and a moon princess who is trying to get reunited with her love. It was very fun to watch... even though we couldn't really understand it.
|
Day 2 TTTTOURISTS!
The moment we have all been waiting for..... Bing Ma Yong!
Terracotta Warriors
These were the main reason we chose Xi'an as our weekend destination. We absolutely loved our whole week here, but The warriors were a breathtaking sight. It is an 8t world wonder. Only about 10% or so of the Terracota warriors are uncovered, but there were 1000's that we saw. I can only imagine when they are all uncovered. It was hauntingly amazing. Each warrior was unique. They were different heights, weights, even skin colors sometimes. The faces were different, the hair, and the armor. It literally is an underground army. Sooo cool!