This was a tour…..a cheap tour!  ($2100CDN including taxes) One that we had second thoughts about because the price just seemed to good to be true.  After reading reviews and going to the agency to check it all out we booked it.  It was late November so we went knowing that the price also reflected that the weather could be iffy….not unlike our Vancouver weather at that time of year.  15 Day Dream of China tour.  It was Beijing, Xi’an, 5 day Yangtze River cruise, Suzhou and Shanghai, 3 domestic flights, all entrance fees and all food.  It also included, besides the 6 of us traveling together, 23 other people on Bus 2 (of 6).  We pretty much knew what to expect “group tour” wise and weren’t disappointed nor were we disappointed in the trip itself!  It was really a great trip to an incredibly interesting country with a fascinating culture and history!  Will do this journal in three parts……

Wed Nov 18

We did a selfie at the airport and sent it to Linds and the girls at work.  (Donna and I worked together and have been friends for 35 years….I retired in May 2015, she was still working when we went on this trip).

While we were having breakfast at the airport Neil and Shirl and Dave and Loyanne all arrived.  Met up and off thru security.  I, as usual, got picked for a random check.  Had the choice of a pat down or going thru the fancy xray machine.  Can’t take your stuff with you to the machine, so I opted for the pat down….no issues.

On the plane loading up.  Donna and I had seats together which was good.  We were pretty close to the back of the plane (China Eastern Airbus A330).  Row 70 of 75, seats J & L….I have the window 🙂  Left the gate a little early….just before 12 noon.   Take off was good…..out over the water so headed in the right direction!    Seats are OK.  Not sure I’d refer to the legroom as “above average” but good enough.

Dinner/lunch was served pretty well right after we leveled off.  Choice of “chicken rice” or “seafood noodle”……had the chicken.  Actually pretty good with teriyaki sauce, rice and veg.  Had the red wine to go with it….pretty yucky.  The meal came with a piece of cake, a bun, coleslaw with a big shrimp and a little Kit Kat bar.

At some point during the flight we changed to tomorrow!  Beijing is 16 hours ahead of Vancouver.

Thurs Nov 19/Fri Nov 20

It’s still the same day to me!  Long, long flight (just about 14 hours) but was OK considering.  Did manage to sleep a couple of hours here and there.  We flew up the coast, not directly out over the Pacific.  Over Alaska, Russia, Siberia….maybe Mongolia too.  I really enjoyed looking out the window at the different landscapes along the way.  The flight attendents were constantly coming along and telling people to close their blinds because…..”sleep now”….it was like 4 in the afternoon for us at that point!!

Breakfast we had the choice of congee (sp?) or eggs…..chose the eggs!  OK, just regular plane food.

Arrived in Shanghai on time…..8PMish, I think….really had no idea of the time at that point.  After customs, everyone went right thru security again and on to the gate for our flight to Beijing.  Had a few hours to kill so found a restaurant/bar and had beers and G & T’s.

No problems going through security there…other than the umbrella!  The flight to Beijing was good….a little less than 2 hours, most of which I managed to sleep!

Arrival was good but a  little chaotic…..luggage from 3 planes on the same carousel.  It was well after midnight by then.  12:01AM China time Nov 20, 6AM (Nov19) Vancouver time.  Have lost a day just in travel and time zones.  A ton of people on these tours!  Lots of different buses.  Finally collected all the people and luggage for our bus and arrived at the Loong Palace at 1:30AM.

What a HUGE hotel!!  Looked nice in the dark.  It was an incredibly long day(s) and I’m glad we won’t do this again on the way home.

Our tour guide is Winston.  They did a bit of a tour change……..we’re going to the Great Wall tomorrow because it’s supposed to snow the next day.  Will do Tiananmen (sp?) and Forbidden City then.

So tired, can’t see straight enough to write anymore….

Fri Nov 20

Up at 7AM.  Very “hung over” feeling even though I didn’t have anything to drink!  Jetlag?  Very long day yesterday, or whatever day it was….

The lobby is a mile away from the rooms!  Down for breakfast around 8.  NO HOT COFFEE!!  Buffet was pretty typical except with the addition of various Chinese dishes like noodles, rice, congee etc.  There was a “Muslim Food” section but had bacon in with the potatoes……shouldn’t have laughed really but was kind of funny!

On the bus at 9:15 to the Great Wall…..in the snow!!  It started a bit earlier than predicted!  It was about an hour drive north…..still kind of in Beijing, Badaling area/section.  Traffic was horrendous!  Snow was coming down pretty good but as we got closer to Badaling we caught glimpses of the wall through the snow, buildings and fences.

Very touristy up there.  Buses parked quite far from the entrance…..15-20 minute walk in the snow.  Shops, a museum, coffee shops etc. along the way.

Very pretty though with the snow and I think it was really quite an opportunity to see it like that.  Unfortunately the visability was minimal so could really only see about 3 or 4 sections and the towers between them.  The wall walkways were very, very slippery.  It was OK for me because I had good tread on my boots, not so for many others.  Other than Loyanne none of us ventured beyond the first tower.  People were slipping and sliding going up and down so just not worth breaking a leg or an arm going further.  They were falling and then, because it was icy too, just sliding down out of control, taking out anyone in their path.  Was quite entertaining to watch really!  Most people ended up on their bums either on purpose, because they’d fallen or someone had wiped them out.  Found a good, safe, out of the way place to enjoy the beauty of it and take a few pictures.  Quite magical really!

Had some time to kill so went and got HOT coffee and then used the washrooms….checking first to make sure they weren’t all the hole in the floor models!!

Next stop was a Cloisonne factory.  Had a quick tour to show how they make it before lunch (there).  Very interesting and intricate work…..very pretty.   https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/clos/hd_clos.htm

Lunch was OK….noodles, rice, chicken, spring rolls (1 each!) sort of sweet and sour pork….but not sure if there was enough for everyone.  There are 29 of us on our bus so our bus group was sat at 3 tables of 10.  Whatever food was put on the table was what you got…..if someone took too much, someone else didn’t get any….especially the meat!  (Food is very subjective, right?. We were prepared for whatever as we had read in the reviews that the food varied from trip to trip…some people saying there was a ton of it, it was great, others said not enough, not good, too “Americanized”, some suggested packing cup a soup/noodles for snacks later!)  What we did have was good…just not enough.

Cloisonné shopping after lunch.  I bought a blouse!!  Cute Chinese style with toggle buttons and some cloisonné Christmas ornaments.  They offered to convert our purchases to Canadian dollars…..no, thank you!  Exchange rate is often higher and regardless of which currency, it still goes through the credit cards a yuan first, so almost like two conversions happen.  Found this out the hard way years ago on a cruise!

Snow was coming down quite heavy…..traffic was worse.  Our next stop was the 2008 Olympic venues back in Beijing.  The birds nest stadium and the “Ice Cube”, which was the water sports centre.  There are also two towers, one called the “5 nails” and the other with the Olympic circles.  Donna, Loyanne and I did the plaza walk.  Just after 4PM and everything was starting to light up.  It was bloody cold by then…..and the wind was whipping up too, making it even colder.  Pretty though with the lights and the snow.  We walked to the end of the plaza and back…..took about an hour.  Was pretty impressive really.  The birds nest is huge.  The plaza was filled with tourists, most of which were Chinese people.  Winston, our tour leader/guide, said seeing this is very important to Chinese people…..they are very proud of what their country did for the Olympics.

Next we were off to dinner at a restaurant that was very similar to the place we had lunch.  It was OK but not all that impressive….Americanized again.  One of our tables ordered Peking duck….which was brought to the table and carved by the waiter…quite a show was put on.  Again, not a lot of food.  You do get a drink with meals…..a glass of beer or coke….but only one!  No coffee or tea….not even green tea!

Back to the hotel just after 7.  We all headed to the bar for a drink or 2.  Lots of fun talking about everything we saw and did today.  Fantastic really….you can’t beat seeing the Great Wall in the snow!  Drinks are NOT cheap here.

Too bed very early for me….9:30.

Sat. Nov 21

Didn’t sleep too bad.  Woke up a couple of times then finally just stayed up at 5:30 (wrote in journal….no coffee makers in the rooms….argh!) .

Off early today 8:15.  Long day.  Tiananmen Square etc. and a rickshaw ride!

Breakfast at the hotel….coffee is NOT hot….if there is any!!  Had to wait for what seemed like forever!  Must remember to bring some packets of instant next time…better than nothing and there was always HOT water for tea.  They do have an omelet station but I didn’t have one.  They also fry up a bunch of eggs and keep them in a warm pan so they’re done just right….were quite good and not mushy like the scrambled eggs.

We were on road by 8:30.  T Square was our first stop.  To get to the square you have to go thru security checks ???  One of the guards was hassling our guide over something…..one of the women in our group, Margaret from Seattle, who is Chinese, told us it was all for show because we were tourists from America….maybe so??  You have to walk thru underground walkways to get to it, then along the street and thru another security check.  The square is HUGE/MASSIVE.  Chairman Mao’s tomb is in one of the buildings….that building too is massive, almost ridiculously so.  There are quite a few monuments, including the big one in the middle that recognizes all the people of China.  Besides the tomb, the square is surrounded by huge buildings, perhaps government offices, flying flags and most covered with red and yellow banners.  There are a ton of street lights in the square each with 5 or 6 or more cameras on them.  There is NO reference anywhere to the massacre that took place here in 1989…….ironically Tiananmen means “gate of heavenly peace”.

It was sooooo cold walking across there I swore my fingertips were going to fall off!  I was also amazed at the number of people…..lots of tourists of course but many people just sort of congregate to socialize/pay respects etc.

At the end of the square there is a building with a big picture of Mao, which is the entrance to the Forbidden City.  Thru security again, which was a bit of joke…..there were so many people they couldn’t have possibly checked everyone.  There were at least 2, or even 3, people at a time walking through the scanners, which just beeped continually.  They didn’t stop anyone.

Shirl and Winston

Once inside, it was pretty incredible.  Just the size of it, bright colours and the elaborate decorations are unreal.   https://www.chinahighlights.com/beijing/forbidden-city/  Virtually impossible to capture the size of the place in a picture…..or the decadence.  The weather also did not help for picture quality!  You don’t know which way to look!  Statues, pots (for plants?), dragons, swans etc. and gardens that I’m sure are beautiful in spring and summer.  Huge stairways. There are outer courtyards, inner courtyards, the palace, all in all over 8,000 rooms.

The only building that was open….not to go in, only to look in….was the emperors bedroom.  It is all just amazing.  We went through just about the entire place, which took over 2 hours.  Very cold….mixed rain, ice and snow the entire time we were wandering around.  Donna’s fitbit has already registered over 10,000 steps and we weren’t anywhere near finished for the day.  We went out thru the back (?) entrance….very pretty, lots of trees, beautiful building, shops and the moat that still surrounds it which was actually very pretty with the misty, sleety weather.

There were so many people though….Winston said probably at least 50,000 and in the summer that number would more than double on any day.  I think half of the 50,000 had umbrellas, which was a bit challenging while wandering around (we had our rain ponchos)  Bad, bad hair day!!

Lunch….was good but again not enough, at least for the men.  After lunch we went to the Temple of Heaven.  Another amazing example of Chinese architecture and history.  A really beautiful park area with a big Pagoda in the centre and some museum buildings surrounding it.  There are a number of covered walkways that local people, mostly retired (men can retire at 60 and women at 55), congregate at.  That’s where they do their socializing as opposed to going to each others houses/apartments.  They play checkers and cards, have tea and chat.  There was another group that had put together a choir….they practiced there every day.  It was pretty neat.  They socialize outside, even all winter, because their houses aren’t very big or too many people live with them.  They can meet with more friends at the same time this way.  They are certainly a hardy bunch!!  It was freezing.

https://www.travelchinaguide.com/attraction/beijing/heaven/

Next was our rickshaw ride in the old Beijing area of Hutong.  Loved it there!  We were in rickshaw #38.  You get tucked in pretty good with a nice warm blanket for your legs.  Once he started pedaling though the wind froze your face and head!  What a neat area Hutong is!! Little alleyways full of houses, shops, bars etc.  Was historically also where the opium dens used to be.

It’s next to a pretty lake.  It would have been great to be able to walk around there…..but such as tours go, we were on a schedule!  We stopped part way through and walked a bit to visit a local family in their “typical” home.  It’s sort of a courtyard affair with 3 or 4 separate buildings around it.  The family (grandparents, parents, kids etc.) usually all live there.  Kitchen and dining room (with a big screen TV!) is one building, the others are basically bedrooms.  Very tiny little kitchen but only one person does the cooking….usually Grandma.  They have chickens running around and various outbuildings for storing food.  Had a garden too but all had been harvested by this time of year.

Back on the rickshaw thru a maze of alleys that were fun and interesting to see.  Lots of chickens, little shops set up in front of peoples houses/courtyards…selling food (lots of chestnut stands)

or flea market type stuff, cars (some rather fancy ones) bicycles galore, carts of all shapes and sizes and of course motorcycles.

Finished the rest of the tour thru Hutong and back to where we started.  Was a really fun experience.  Was very interesting to see how they lived….based on things Winston has told us, and Margaret, I’m becoming a bit of skeptic when it comes to what “normal life” here is…..could some of it be staged for our benefit??

Dinner was bizarre!!  A restaurant at the Ramada Inn, but instead of our tables being IN the restaurant, we were pretty much right in the middle of the lobby!  They left the doors open….for what reason, who knows.  The waitstaff wore coats with aprons over them!!  It was pretty ridiculous really.  We kept getting up and closing the doors.  The real restaurant was up a couple of steps from where we were.  Food was pretty well the same as what we’ve been having everywhere else.  I was hoping that there would be a bit of variety, but no.  Donna thought she’d buy a bottle of wine from the restaurant because it was cheaper than buying it by the glass at the hotel.  Much confusion!!!  She picked out a bottle, which they bagged for her (turned out to be a 2009!!  Not the one she actually picked out!  We tried it but absolutely not drinkable….ah sigh.)

After dinner we took a drive by the Olympic Park to see it all lit up.  Pretty nice!  The Ice Cube/watersport centre changes colours, the sides kind of look like bubbles.  It was interesting driving back in the dark looking down some of the smaller side streets.

The city is an incredible mix of old, ancient, art deco-ish, modern and ultra-modern.  Some things are just a strange mix side by side…..other things are just foreign to us, like squatty potties….haven’t had to use one yet and will try to avoid at all costs, or you walk into a little store with gold plated ceiling and a massive chandelier but everything else in it is a mess…shelves half falling down, dirty cracked floors etc.  They build big beautiful buildings with grand gardens and statues but don’t bother with any upkeep.  At our hotel, which has a big beautiful garden with tumbled over statues and green stagnant water in ponds that had some fountains going, others not, there are two huge bowl-like planters on the driveway, they’re at least 10ft across, filled with dead, and now snow covered, summer plants still in them.  One of the bowls is tilted a bit, probably hit by a car!?  There’s a big fountain in the courtyard, probably 25-30ft tall but the pinecone top thing has tipped over and they’ve just left it that way.  I hope lots of the pictures I’ve taken from the bus turn out.  The best pictures ever……every day life on the streets/down alleys is so fascinating to me.

Every traffic light and a lot of the street lights, especially at major intersections, have cameras on them…..about 10 of them facing each direction.  Not sure if they are for traffic or for spying on people!

To the bar for a nightcap…..was 1/2 price happy hour but too tired to take advantage of it!  To bed a bit later tonight.  Very tired after a long, chilly but fascinating day!

Sun Nov 22

Bizarre, crazy day…..will begin with the normal part……

Up early again but we didn’t have to leave until 9:30.  We did have to have our checked bag out in the hallway by 8AM for loading on the bus.  Breakfast was good…..there was lots of HOT coffee!  It was snowing….A LOT!

Our first stop was at the pearl farm.  Interesting little bit of info on pearls and a short video, then shopping.  They certainly weren’t very pushy,  which was good, but not what we were expecting.  The place was packed….many tour buses in the parking lot.  If they pulled a tray out for you to look at, you had about 30 seconds to make your pick, if you didn’t make a decision quickly, they’d whip the tray away and move on to someone else……didn’t need that bracelet anyway!  Everything was pretty expensive, definitely catering to tourists…on buses!

The snow was really coming down when we left and headed for the Summer Palace.  I think this has been my favorite spot so far!  Absolutely beautiful and more so in the snow.  There is a really nice park surrounding it.  Lots of trees…..beautiful willows, weeping right into the water of the lake.  A big pagoda at the entrance gate that you go through that opens onto the lake and another pagoda on a little jut of land into the lake.  The temple (Buddhist) is up on the hillside partway around the lake.  It looked surreal in the snow! Many photo ops here…..the canal with little bridges, the bamboo forest, then way around the lake, you can walk along a path, supposedly 7km, out onto a big bridge that goes to a little island out in the middle of the late.  All of it manmade for the “Dragon Lady” who was the mother of the last Emperor (the movie).  We walked on the covered walkway on the right side…walls and ceiling covered in artwork that took 20 years and many artists to complete.

Many, many willow trees that look very pretty around all the buildings and quite magical in the snow.  Would have loved to spend a lot more time there…..so much to see and so many places to wander and be awed by the views in every direction.  Was beautiful today in the snow but would love to see it some day in the summer when everything is in bloom.

https://www.travelchinaguide.com/cityguides/beijing/summer.htm

Off to lunch…..very interesting restaurant today!  After going through these heavy plastic or whatever hanging things over the doors (kind of like the matts at the gym!!) it was like walking into a country and western bar/restaurant.  All the railings had chuckwagon wheels, checkered tablecloths and ranchy/farm type decorations everywhere…..oh boy we thought….burgers!  Nope, was Chinese and pretty much the same stuff we’ve had the other days.  It was kind of a fun place though….spent lots of time just looking around at everything….and they had good, clean bathrooms!

After lunch we visited a tea house.  Fun!  I liked it there…..very clean and orderly shop.  We went upstairs where they demonstrated how to make and pour tea properly.  We tried 4 or 5 different ones.  The first one was oolong.  All the teas are natural so no caffeine (?).  All were interesting and quite good.  It’s very important that the water temp is correct!  Too hot is not good…..water is boiled but then left to cool a bit.  I bought 2 different kinds.  One was the fruity kind…..all diced and dried fruit (apricots, berries) and rose buds!  I don’t like sweet tea but this was really quite good and would make an excellent iced tea for the summer.

Bought a tea mug for Linds that changes picture/colour when you pour in the hot water….cute.  And a little “pee pee boy” ……this helps you tell if the water is the right temperature for your tea.  It’s red clay and you soak it in water so that the little hole in the penis fills up with water…..when you pour your hot water for tea on the little guy, if it’s the right temperature, he will pee!  Cute too…..think the grandkids will get a kick out of it.

Then the not so normal…..

From the tea shop it was directly to the airport.  It was snowing a lot more by then and getting colder by the minute so the snow was really sticking.  Traffic to the airport was a mess…..also rush hour (not really sure that you can distinguish a difference here though….it seems like it’s always rush hour!)  When we arrived we found that a bunch of flight were delayed and/or cancelled.  Ours wasn’t even on the board yet.  We were issued boarding passes but with no gate assigned.  Had a some time to kill before we had to meet back up with Winston so headed to a restaurant more snacks and drinks.  Back at the desk, he didn’t have anymore details, other than what we had seen, which was the flight was on the board but showing as delayed, still no gate #.  He told us to keep checking and to meet again either at the gate if it was going to go, or if it showed up as cancelled back at the desk.  If still showing delayed to meet again….or send someone to get the info…..at 8PM (our flight was supposed to depart at 7)!

Back to a different restaurant where we ordered beer and wine.  Met up there with the 2 couples from Rhode Island and proceeded to go through a lot more beer!  Someone kept going out every 15 min or so to check the board for a gate and boarding time.  At just after 7:30 it popped up with gate 67 and boarding at 8!  Hooray we thought!  At the gate an announcement came on telling us it was now delayed, then about 10 minutes later another one telling us it was now cancelled.  Not all 6 buses were flying…..a couple had gone via highspeed train earlier in the day, lucky them assuming there were no issues with the trains.  There were enough of us at that gate plus all the non-tour passengers too to cause a lot of chaos.  Winston and the other tour guides tried to keep everything and everyone as organized as possible….they did a pretty darn good job considering!  We all (the tour groups at least) were herded out of the airport outside (really snowing and really cold!) to wait for buses.  It took what seemed like forever.  There were other tour buses, shuttle buses from various hotels and a zillion people.  A bus from the “Super 8” hotel pulled up and we were told to get on.  It was a little bus that only held about 10 people!!  So a mad scramble.  Some of our group managed to get on it, but most of us were left in the line(ish).  We finally managed to get on the second to last bus…..was way past 11PM by then.  Patience, patience.   I think they said 300 flights (!), coming and going, had been cancelled and were continuing to be cancelled….that makes for a lot of people hanging around outside the airport.  Eventually arrived at the “Super 8” hotel (just about midnight by then) to find that our RI friends and the Mexican family had managed to get rooms but now it was full……I was secretly wishing bedbugs on them at that point…lol!!

We ended up being bused to another hotel….or MOT L (E was burnt out!).  Was a little worried at first.  The lobby, which was very cold, temp wise and very unaesthetically appealing (really bright lights, industrial mishmash of chairs, rather dirty tile floor…fair enough it was snowing and there were a LOT of people…. bars on windows etc.)  was full of tour people and some Armenian (?) business people……all yelling!  Chinese people yelling, Armenian people yelling….at each other… in their own languages!!  Not sure how effective it was.  Tour guides were trying to get a word in edgewise regarding accommodation for their groups…tour people and guides were all looking quite exhausted….it was well after midnight and everyone just wanted to sleep.  Finally, finally, we got a room!  The MOT L looked like it might have been an army barracks at some point in it’s life.  The room was actually really good!  It had all been redone to look like sort of a boutique hotel.  It had comfy beds with nice puffy comforters and pillows.  BUT….NO HEAT!  It was freezing.  The window looked out onto another hallway.  The floors were marble or tile so cold too.  It was really clean, which was all that really mattered.

Donna and I both crawled into our beds half dressed.  We had no idea what time we had to be up or if we were even going to be able to leave in the morning.

Monday Nov 23

Wake up call at 4:45.  Donna hopped in the shower, I went looking for coffee, only to see the buses loading up!  Mad rush at that point to get going….no breakfast, no coffee or anything.  Winston had got us booked on the 7AM flight to Xi’an.  He is such a good tour guide even through all the chaos last night…he made sure all 29 of his group had somewhere to sleep and had managed to get us on one of the first flight out this morning!  Good job…..even though no coffee!!

Our flight (China Eastern) was an hour late leaving because of the back up from all the cancellations and delays yesterday.   As we were taking off the sun came out!!  Flight was an hour and a half.  “Breakfast” was served….a very dry bun with fish of some sort in the middle, yogurt, pickled veg salad and congee…..NO BLOODY COFFEE!!  Just water.  Overall was pretty crappy.

Xi’an is supposed to be warmer because it’s a bit further south but it was mixed rain and snow.  Xi’an has 9 million people!  Lots of new highrise apartments…..like really lots!! They use coal but we also saw what looked like nuclear silos.  There are so many new buildings it’s hard to believe anyone will ever live in half of them.  Lots of traffic of course, which includes scooters, bicycles, funny little 3 wheeled trucks (sort of like tuks tuks).  You see whole families on scooters! Little trucks with wooden sides filled with men/women….maybe for work? Way more here than we saw in Beijing.  A local tour guide joined us for the hour long bus ride.  She talked about how the terracotta warriors were found and the Emperor that had them made.  She also talked a lot about the other various dynasties but in all honesty I think most of our group were dozing thru the whole talk.  It was interesting but a little too much to process after last night….and no coffee this morning.  Our first stop was NOT the hotel.

We were off to lunch at the Terracotta Museum where they make replica warriors, emperors and captains and horses.  Lunch was a huge big buffet on the 3rd floor of the museum building.  Still Americanized Chinese but with some different dishes….still no coffee! So I had a beer, what the hell eh?!!  The 2nd floor was art and furniture.  The first was all the terracotta stuff with some demonstrations of how they made miniature warriors etc. using the original method that was used to make the real ones.  Very interesting!  I bought a warrior for 140Y (about $40 CDN).  The detail on these is incredible.  I was wandering around and found…..a coffee bar!!  I had a cappuccino.

Off to see the warriors!  So exciting….this was one of the main highlights of this trip for me.  Who would have thought that I’d actually get to see this place??  The site is massive.  It was a 1km+ walk from the bus and then the site itself, if you manage to visit everything it is another 2 or 3km of walking.  There are 3 separate building for the warriors and horses and another for the chariots.  #1 building is the original site where they were found.  It’s set up really well so you can walk all the way around.  The front part is all the warriors and their horses and even wagons/carts in rows.  They have taken great care to rebuild/restore them properly…..which was good to know!  It was pretty amazing to be able to see this!  They are still doing excavations at site #1 so you could watch some of the work they were doing.  At the back end there was what they called the “warrior hospital”.  You could see how they were painstakingly rebuilding the warriors and horses.  The detail on everyone of them is incredible.  Each one is different and unique, since they are replicas of real warriors, so it is like putting together a bunch of giant jigsaw puzzles where someone kind of threw all the pieces together and you have to sort out which pieces go with which puzzle.  There were piles of bits and pieces, all numbered just waiting to be put on the warrior they belonged too.  Many of the warriors were pretty much intact but still quite a few with bits missing…..probably in those piles somewhere.

Building #2 is the second site found.  There wasn’t as much to see there other than rows of the dirt and more digging and excavation work…..and more bits and pieces.  How and when they are ever going to put all this together seems quite formidable.

We were advised to skip building #3 because there wasn’t much to see there yet…..smaller site and still a work in progress, nor did we go to the mausoleum.  We did go to the Exhibition Hall that holds beautiful bronze statues of warriors, captains, horses  chariots.  One of the chariots was for the guy who was like the police chief or head of security.  The other was the Emperors…it was smaller and all closed up except for a few slits that he could see out of.  He had a bunch of different ones so people wouldn’t know which one he was going to use…..he was quite the tyrant so lots of people wanted to get rid of him.  There is also a little movie that tells about the Qin dynasty.  Very interesting!

The whole site is a park, which was very well tended, even at this time of year….would probably be quite lovely in spring and summer.  We all met up at the gift store/coffee shop at 4:30.  I had another coffee….Americano with extra hot water….a bit of a challenge language wise but it all worked out!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terracotta_Army

Long walk back to the bus through a market/shopping area with lots of sourvenir stores. Very cold but not snowing/sleeting/raining…..certainly felt and looked like it could any minute.

Off to dinner……took almost 2 hours to get there.  It was so fascinating driving thru the city in rush hour.  Traffic lights don’t mean too much….they are simply a “suggestion”.  Cars, carts, bikes, moped, pedestrians….everywhere and going in every direction regardless of which side of the road or the colour of the traffic lights.  It had started to snow/rain by then so people had umbrellas attached to their bikes and scooters.  Some had proper covers on them.  Looking down the side streets was so interesting….lots to see.  Stores, stands selling fruit (white pomegranites!), cook food, soup, noodles etc.  People, anyone….seems to set up big pots or woks on the sidewalks selling whatever they were cooking.

The place we went for dinner was huge big beautiful hotel….not ours…..have no clue though which one….was right across the street from one of the entrances to the ancient walled city.  Big staircases, mega chandeliers, huge pots of plants and some very elaborate floral displays.  Dinner was a buffet, which included soups and noodles made to order and ALL the beer you could drink.  We had our fair share even though everyone was pretty tired.  Excellent food and by far the best meal/buffet we’ve had so far……could the food be getting better??  Pinched a couple of instant coffee packets!

Winston told us our hotel was a 10 minute drive…..not quite!  Close to an hour to get there…..10PM!  Hotel is the Holiday Inn Xi’an Big Goose Pagoda.  Also huge and beautiful.  We had room 710….very nice room, comfy beds and everything, like the lights and TV, worked…bonus!  Sent Linds an email for her birthday just in case we don’t get internet/wifi on the boat.   Facebook is blocked in China….unless you have VPN, which John, the guy from Delta, said he could help with….not sure if I’ll bother though.

Tues Nov 24

Wake up call at 7 but both Donna and I were up around 6.  Slept great…..lucky I brought the coffee packets from the other hotel because the ones there already had the cream and sugar in it!  This hotel had the best breakfast buffet yet.  Bacon….so exciting and HOT coffee and lots of it!  Had scrambled eggs with spring onion…..made to order, really hot and very tasty.  Luggage had to be outside our door by 8.  They took it directly to the airport for us so we won’t see it again until be get on board the boat.

It will be nice to stay in the same place for 5 nights!  This is the problem with these kinds of tours…..even without snowstorms.  I was really sorry we only had one night at the Holiday Inn….it was pretty darn nice and we should have been there the day before but oh well, not much we can do about it.

On the bus by 9 to go and see the Big Goose Pagoda.  Didn’t get to go in but wandered around for an hour so.  Nice park and a big wide avenue with lots of statues and trees. the park is surrounded by restaurants, souvenir stands and lots of vendors selling toys and kind of junky stuff.  Quite a nice day….so far.  Chilly but brighter and no rain/snow.

Off to the Jade factory.  I didn’t really listen to the spiel and just wandered around the shop instead….was not in the market for anything, but some very lovely stuff.  All the jade, good quality of whatever, was really ridiculously expensive.  I did buy 3 small pictures with the Chinese characters for longevity, good health and fortune (at least I think that’s what they say!) Spent way too much time there to me.

Then headed for the airport for the buffet lunch and all the beer you want!  Lunch buffet was good, not very big but enough variety.

Driving around Xi’an, or Beijing for that matter, is really an incredible experience.  It is hard for me, or probably most people from North America, to understand how people can live like they do here….we really are spoiled!  Kind of like Mexico or Jordan I guess….you get used to what you have.  Huge modern buildings right next to old dilapidated ones, some in such a state that you can’t tell if they are new ones being built and have just been left as is, or old ones being torn down.  Most newer apartments have, or had, balconies but they have been closed in to make more living space.  Terribly messy store fronts with a mishmash of businesses side by side, tacky storefronts with bronze lions on either side of the door but cracked or boarded up windows….etc. etc.  Not really a lot of “garbage” garbage just a lot of junk and stuff!  Sidewalks with big chunks missing, or heaved with lots of cracks….Winston says they aren’t very good at repairing things!!  And no one complains about it!  Supposedly the city wouldn’t fix it anyway…..they say it’s the responsibility of the shop/building owner and the owners say it’s the cities so it just stays as is.  Once it was dark you could see in the windows of some buildings and most had only bare lightbulbs or fluorescent bulbs, ….but big screen TV’s.  Lots of laundry of course and because most windows have bars or some sort of a bar contraption on them, even food gets stored outside (take advantage of whatever space you can find) There are big empty lots full of bricks, water and garbage (real garbage). A lot of buildings old and new that are just empty shells.  It does look like they start to do things and then never finish or build big beautiful things but don’t look after them.  Or build really tacky things and then try to fill them with big expensive (looking?) things like chandeliers and statues.   This is not bad, it is just different…..I find it all amazing and incredibly interesting.  Truly, travel does open your eyes!

After lunch we went thru security…..who did not want to see my umbrella, or iPad, or anything in my bag this time but I did get a pat down.  Xi’an airport is very big and very nice.

Flight was just over one hour….very bumpy the entire time.   Very beautiful seeing all the rice paddies enroute.

Wuhan is a huge city of 14 million people.  Didn’t see much, or any of it really.  Because the bus ride to Yichang is 4+ hours, Winston got us KFC chicken sandwiches and fries to eat on the go.  (was supposed to start our cruise in Jingzhou but river was too low so had to move an hour or two further down river to Yichang)  Off to a good start, until we hit a BLIZZARD!  It very rarely snows here apparently.  Because of the weather the drive took closer to 5 hours…..and was quite scary really!  Snow blowing, huge big trucks whipping by us.  We had a big bus so all 29 of us pretty much had our own seats…..I used my bag for a pillow and managed to get in a bit of a nap.  We did have a pit stop at a Chinese auto stop/store.  One poor old lady working….lots of buses and trucks stopped.  Terrible bathrooms, only hot things were eggs boiled in tea and a coffee vending machine…..grabbed a coffee out of it and a bag of chips.

Arrived in Yichang sometime after 10PM.  Very chilly on the water and very breezy.  The river IS really low….you can tell by the number of steps we had to walk down and they set up sort of gangplanks at the bottom to get on the boat….a mix of wooden and metal planks to get us to the pier/dock.  Donna and I are in cabin 232.  Very nice cabin with a balcony.  Bathroom is a good size for a cruiseship.  Big shower….storage is lacking tho.  Only the closet and night table drawers.  Lobby is nice, big chandelier in the centre which is open all the way up to deck 6.  Lots of gold and black on the railings, big staircase.  Two elevators that are glass on the waterside…..all quite lovely!

Nothing is open on the ship!  No bars, no coffee, no food, nada. They said everyone is tired from traveling all day??  Except most people had slept for a couple hours on the bus.  There is a kettle and a couple different kinds of tea in the room.  Unpacked a bit and to bed.  Looking forward to starting this cruise!

Our ship  https://www.chinahighlights.com/yangtzecruise/yangtze-gold-8/

5 days on the Yangtze River next…….