Shanghainese - glad you are reading along. I hope I haven't offended anyone by the title of this thread. As I've said before, while we were underwhelmed, much of that may stem from the fact that our prior experiences in Asia were so overwhelming and that we are now more used to things typically Asian that we've seen and experienced elsewhere. I hope you can see by the rest of this report that we really enjoyed ourselves on this trip. Please feel free to chime in. Your own perspective would be interesting to hear.

Just catching up with your report which I am enjoying very much. Although we've been to China, we did not visit either Pingyao or Datong and I was interested to read about what we missed.

Train from Pingyao to Xi'An:

Besides having to find the correct train in a short time, we were also worried about the condition of the cabin. We did not know what to expect prior to arriving on the hard sleeper train, were concerned that it would be very smoky, the beds too hard and the noise level too loud to get sufficient sleep. Upon our arrival, we discovered three men already sitting on the first level berth that my husband was supposed to sleep on. Even worse than that, we realized that my berth was the top one (3 rows up) and I did not think I would physically be able to climb up and down to get into the bed. Additionally, there were seats in the hallway that pulled down for passengers not lucky enough to have been able to purchase sleeper compartments since they were all booked. We were afraid that the men sitting along the hallway would talk all night. Fortunately, we worried needlessly. We showed our tickets to the men sitting on my husband’s berth and they got off his bed. On the bottom berth, opposite my husband’s, was a nice elderly man. His traveling companion was his daughter who I convinced to trade berths with me, so I only had to go up to the second level. After my prior overnight, I was confident that I could handle that. Thankfully, the train was not smoky, the beds no harder than the soft berth sleepers, and the lights were turned off approximately one hour into the ride. People were quiet and very considerate. Those sitting in the hallway somehow managed to get sleeping compartments as other passengers departed the train.

One half hour prior to arrival in Xi’an, the lights were turned on and passengers were awakened. It was quite a scene watching the Chinese prepare to exit the train. Several changed their clothing without worrying that others could see, while others washed their heads, face and even their clothing in the wash basins outside the toilet area. Exiting the train was an amazing sight, for I had never before seen such a massive wave of people exiting the train station at once. We attempted to find a taxi to pick us up and were confused when they all refused to pick us up despite being empty. Others also attempted to hire a taxi, but we all discovered that one must cross the street in front of the station and then cross again to the left side where taxis are allowed to pick up passengers. There was no signage and this was all very confusing.

Upon finally hiring a taxi, we drove to the Mercure hotel where our room was not yet ready. While waiting, we had a leisurely breakfast, then headed up to the room to shower and freshen up before proceeding out for the day.

By 10:00 we headed out again, walking from our hotel to the old quarters. Our hotel was a 15-20 minute walk to Bell Tower which was situated on a street filled with malls and high end shopping. Just past the Bell Tower is the Drum Tower and still further, the Muslim quarter. The weather was damp and rainy, but we had on our gortex jackets and were determined to see the sites. In retrospect, we should have headed to the Terracotta Warriors this day as they are situated indoors, to protect them from the weather.

I never expected Xi’an to be such a large city. We knew that it was a walled city and that the warriors were outside the city center. We had intended to bike the city wall, however, the weather was not conducive to doing so and we walked it for just a short time. Despite the weather being poor (a light drizzle throughout the day), the walk to the Drum & Bell Tower as well as around the Muslim Quarter was very pleasant. After visiting the Bell and Drum Towers we continued on to the Muslim Quarters, wandering around this area for quite a while, looking at the interesting food, tasting various meats cooked on skewers (mutton and pork), eggs on a stick and various other snacks. We checked out various merchandise being sold and noticed the same pashminas that I had purchased in Turkey (Made in China of course).

Later, heading back to our hotel, we noticed, as in Hanoi, that there were certain streets devoted to the sale of one type of merchandise…phone street, barber street, etc.
We were surprised that in Xi’an, very little English was spoken or understood. We also observed that when making eye contact and smiling at the Chinese people, we would rarely get a smile back in return and we wondered if this was a cultural thing or if the Chinese people were less inclined to smile back at Westerners. This is not to say that the Chinese people were unfriendly or unhelpful…but it was something we wondered about.

While I had previously heard that the Chinese people do not have the same understanding of personal space as Westerners, I did not have a problem with that. However, we did notice that the drivers seem to drive as if they have the road to themselves, only yielding to other vehicles and people at the last moment, if necessary. In China the vehicle seems to have the right of way, rather than people and we felt less safe crossing streets here than in other Asian countries that we have visited.

Again in Xi’an we found all the Western chain restaurants; Starbucks, McDonalds, KFCs, and Pizza Huts, as well as all major shopping brands in the malls. We were happy to avail ourselves of the free wi-fi in Starbucks and to get out of the rain for intervals during the day. We returned to our hotel by 5 pm. I don’t recall where we did dinner this night. Overall, we had enjoyed our time strolling around the tree lined streets of Xi'an and the interesting muslim quarters.

Warriors - next day.

Wow, Xi'an has changed so much! When I was there in 1997 the Bell and Drum towers were on an empty square. When I came back in 2002 rhere was a mall underneath the square and a new MacDonalds being built. It was much the same in 2004. I doubt I would recognize it now.

i agree with your overview.. the city is huge.. you did not mention air pollution---i found it about the worst i have ever encountered.

the lovely tree lined streets inside the city wall (a very small portion of the over-all city) were wide and inviting. Modernization has taken over Xian and large parts of it could be located almost anyplace in the world.

in my report i did not mention the personal space issue. it is alive and well. Chinese we encountered all need to be at the head of every line, no matter what. they bump into you with no comment, cut in front of everyone if they can get away with it... drive their new modern lux cars as if they are the only people in the city... we saw U turns being made in the middle of busy intersections, lane changes with precious little room, etc. it was off putting, but you ignore it after a while.

Too bad about the biking around the city wall. That was the highlight of our trip to Xian. But the air pollution was intense.

I was approached by a hooker in the Bell Tower. That impressed our two sons, who didn't really care that she wanted money. They thought she liked me.

Colduphere - very funny...I'm sure she liked you, but she liked your money more!

The pollution was very bad, but not to the extent that it was in Nanjing when we were there later in the trip. In Beijing, we were told that there are days that you cannot see the buildings across the street due to the pollution. This is a great problem for the Chinese people and I worry about their future health problems.

October 22 – Day 14:

We arranged for a driver through the hotel and while her English skills were not great, she was instructed by the hotel to take us first to the Terracotta Museum and then to the Banpo Village site. Upon arriving at the parking area near the museum, a guide came up to us and seemed to know the taxi driver. This was a licensed guide with the government credentials so we hired him for 150 yuan. He agreed to bring us back to the driver when we were done with the tour. The driver parked on a street a few blocks from the museum and without the guide, we may not have been able to find our way back to her. While the guide’s English was excellent, we discovered that we did not really need his services as there were written explanations in English that were as informative as he was. In retrospect, I was sorry to have hired him as we did not pay good attention to where the driver would be parked and we needed him to return to the taxi. I wanted to stop for lunch at the cafeteria close to the museum, which had been recommended by others, but was frustrated that we were unable to stop there as the guide was finished with his tour and anxious to return us to our driver.

As had been suggested by others, we first visited the Exhibition hall to see the movie on the warriors and then proceeded to pits 3, 2 & 1, in that order. While the guide did not suggest this to us, he was agreeable after I told him we would like to save the best for last and he noted that others like saving pit #1 for last as it has the most warriors and is the most impressive. As most are familiar with the history of the Terracotta Warriors, I will not go into details regarding this archeological find. The discovery is amazing as is the history and the site was exactly as I imagined it would be.

When we found our driver, she and the guide suggested that we eat in one of the local restaurants situated nearby, but as there were few people eating in them, we declined and proceeded to the Banpo Museum which was a short drive away. This museum which is situated at the base of the excavations of the Banpo site, exemplifies the typical Neolithic matriarchal community of the Yangshao Culture dating back about 6,000 years. We spent a short time in the museum, which we thought was ok, but not worth going out of the way for.

We returned to our hotel and decided to stay close to the hotel as we were tired. Our hotel was located in a complex along with the Sofitel and Grand Mercure, all owned by the Accor Group. For dinner we decided to try the Sofitel’s buffet, which had an extensive selection of both western and asian fare and which we enjoyed.

dgunbug,
I'm enjoying reading about your exploits...and you're a lot more adventurous than I am to take overnight trains. My big question is....did you find the warriors a highlight of your trip? I think you know that we skipped Xian....so I'm hoping you're going to say no!

Barefoot - I wish I could say it was a highlight, but in truth, despite the warriors and their discovery being amazing, it was nothing more than I had imagined and I don't think you made a mistake by not going there. Where is your report anyway? I'm glad to see you reading this.

Gotta get my grandmotherly duties of Holiday shopping & shipping for 8 done before I start...I hope to get to it soon.

The contributions from Chinese posters here are fascinating but I have a problem. My son has just gone to Shenzhen for a year - where can he go to see more than the megapolis without travelling for days?

1. Fly to Taiwan, lol.
2. Fly to Kunming and get on a bus heading south.
3. Possibly, fly to Datong and get on a bus going north. Haven't tried that.

October 23 – Day 15:

Our last day in Xi’an was rainy as well, which was a shame as we took a taxi to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda (Dayan Pagoda), a well-preserved ancient building and holy place for Buddhists. We climbed to the top of the Pagoda which afforded a good look down upon the city. This rather large complex would have been lovely to walk around in if the weather had been better. There is a lovely fountain and park area which we wandered about despite the rain and I am certain that there would have been many people and activities going on if the weather was not so dismal.

We returned once again to the Drum Tower by taxi and wandered toward the Muslim quarter where we sampled a delicious noodle soup with lamb meat. Pickled garlic was served on the side. We also sampled fried dough with lamb meat and veggies, again excellent, but very greasy. We tried the tempting rice on a stick with chocolate sauce and sugar, but tossed it as we did not care for the taste. We continued to wander and headed down back streets which were a bit away from the tourist area, finally returning to the Bell and Drum tower to view them lit up and to take more pictures. After a long day out, we returned to our hotel, made arrangements for a taxi the next morning and an early wake up call.

October 24 – Day 16:

The train station to Louyang, our next destination was approximately 40 minutes away in the Central Station, different from the train station that we had arrived in. As we were scheduled to depart at 7:05, we awakened at 4:45 and headed out by taxi at 5:30 AM. The Central train station is very new and we easily found our G-train. The seats were extremely comfortable and reclined nicely. The bathrooms were western style and very clean. The train traveled up to 297 kilometers/hr. and arrived in Luoyang at 9:05.
Upon our arrival we easily found the left luggage area to store our luggage while we toured the grottoes for which Louyang is famous. We found a taxi driver and agreed on a price for him to take us to the grottoes, wait for us, then take us back to pick up our luggage, after which he would take us to the central train station (again different from the one we arrived at) where we would depart on the 7:50 pm train to Nanjing. We discovered that we could have left our luggage at the entrance to the grottoes as they also had a storage area there. We also could have easily found a taxi to take us to the train station and did not need to pay a driver to wait for us.

Unlike the grottoes in Datong, one is prevented from getting up close to the Buddha carvings as there are railings to prevent one from touching the ancient treasures or from climbing around in the caves. This is probably best to preserve these relics, but we enjoyed the grottoes more in Datong. The grottoes in Louyang are located along a river and great efforts have been made to make the grounds nice to stroll through. The grottoes are located on both sides of the river.

We finished exploring the grottoes by 1:30, found our driver and headed to the train station. It had been our intent to store our luggage, get something to eat and explore the town of Louyang while awaiting our train, but by this time I had a terrible headache, having only eaten an ice-cream as there was little food to buy at the grottoes. We decided to find something in the KFC which was adjacent to the train station and I am embarrassed to say that we ended up staying there for hours, deciding against storing our luggage and exploring the city as we were just too exhausted. It was a long day spent reading in the KFC restaurant where we sat until approximately 6:50 pm, at which time we headed to the train station to find the waiting area for our overnight train to Nanjing. In retrospect, we would not recommend going to both the grottoes of Datong and Louyang. Given the choice, we would suggest spending time in Datong as the grottoes there were more interesting and as it could be paired with the Hanging Monastary which was also quite interesting.

That night we shared our overnight soft sleeper train with a very nice Chinese gentlemen who was a German professor accompanying two Chinese students to a German language debate at Nanjing University. The professor spoke limited English, but was also able to converse with my husband, who speaks limited German. The two students, who were staying in another compartment, came to visit and ended up staying to chat with us for several hours. While they were German majors, they both spoke excellent English and we had a most interesting conversation with them. By 10:00 the lights were shut and we called it a night. We slept quite well on this train and enjoy both the ride and the company.

KFC or not, sometimes you just have to listen to your body and rest. The mind is willing....but the body says "No way....I'm parking it for awhile." We certainly expect more physically from ourselves traveling than we do at home. It sounds like you've had quite the tour of different train stations!

Anyone interested in more? Hate writing these reports and not sure there's alot of interest.

Hey Dgunbug, I'm following and am sure there are others too. However, the reports should be fun for you, not dreadful. You know yourself better than anyone else, so if you hate it, then...

I'm here, enjoying your report. Please keep writing. These reports are so valuable when dug up later by people who are planning trips.

Tripplanner & Marija - thanks for the encouragement.


October 25 (Saturday)– Day 17:

Upon our arrival in Nanjing, we headed to the ticket counter where we purchased train tickets for our departure to Hangzhou two days later. We easily found a taxi to take us to the Jinglin Hotel where we were checked in quickly. We were pleasantly surprised to be upgraded to an executive room and enjoyed our stay here as the hotel was beautifully furnished and the rooms comfortable. The staff members had excellent English skills and were very helpful.

After freshening up and enjoying a tasty breakfast in the hotel, we set out by taxi to the very moving and quite remarkable Nanjing Massacre Memorial Museum which reminded us of past Holocaust museums we have visited. I would definitely recommend a visit to this museum.

From there we took a taxi to the Zhonghua gate to view the city wall. We stayed only a short time as we considered the wall to be unremarkable. Our drive there though, had been quite remarkable. The traffic was congested, the drivers aggressive, and our taxi driver came within inches of hitting a motorcyclist. As in the other cities we had visited, Chinese drivers drive haphazardly, changing lanes as they please, changing directions, driving in bike lanes and on sidewalks. It is a wonder how effectively they manage to get to their destination without killing one another! We noted that the pedestrians in China DO NOT have the right of way, but rather it is the vehicle that does and the larger the vehicle, the greater the right of way. Somehow it all works out.

Leaving the city wall, we set out to find the Confucius Temple which we thought was close by on Gongyuan Street. Although we had some difficulty finding the temple, we enjoyed our stroll along the tree lined streets. Along the way, we wandered past a Walmart store and decided to have a look inside to see how the merchandise compared to that of the Walmarts in the USA. Being well past our lunch hour, we decided to purchase a cooked duck which we brought with us into the KFC restaurant , attached to Walmart’s premises. There we sat down at their tables to enjoy our lunch, which my husband considered one of the best we had in China.

After finishing lunch, we finally found Gongyuan street, a lovely pedestrian area lined with restaurants and shops alongside a canal. This area is very touristy and there were men dressed as “coolies” pulling rickshaws as well as motorized open seated transportation available for hire. We wandered around here for many hours, finally selecting a restaurant for dinner. Dinner consisted of an eggplant dish and chicken with cashews, both a bit sweet and fair. We were glad that we remained in the area for dinner as the area was lit up after dark and was very picturesque with boats along the canals and lanterns hanging.

We returned to the hotel by taxi and decided to take a walk around the shopping district nearby which was filled with malls and high end shopping. We were amazed by the beautiful buildings, the massive tv screens everywhere which are used for advertisement and of course the abundance of Starbucks, KFCs, and McDonalds at every turn.

October 26 (Friday) Day 18:

After breakfast we took a taxi to the Sun Yat-Sen’S Mausoleum located in the Zhong Mountain Scenic Area in the east suburb of Nanjing City. As the mausoleum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the father of the Republic of China, it is considered the Holy land of Chinese people. With deep historical significance, magnificent architecture and beautiful scenery, it is a must see when traveling in Nanjing and we thoroughly enjoyed our day here. We spent a good part of the day walking through the beautiful grounds of the purple mountain, along the wooded path of the Zhongshan hill scenic area to the Memorial Hall of Dr Sun Yat-sen and surprisingly, we saw no other Westerners the entire day. After climbing the many steps up to the Memorial Hall, we returned to the bottom and boarded a park train which took us to the Xiaoling Tomb of Ming Dynasty. We walked along the sacred path adorned with stone animals – lions, camels, horses and elephants while chatting with several young college students who led us along the way. The fall foliage made the grounds even more spectacular and the weather was perfect, although we could not believe the poor quality of the air which was very smoggy.

Exiting this area, we found a taxi and headed to the Presidential palace on Changjiang Road which we hoped to see before it closed. This palace housed Chiang Kai-shek, the President of the Republic of China before the republic relocated to Taiwan 1949 and it is now the China Modern History Museum. Having only a short time before the museum closed, we raced quickly through it. Unfortunately, it began to rain, curtailing our visit as we wandered the gardens of the palace area. Exiting the premises, we happened upon a Starbucks and stopped in to get out of the rain and to use the internet.

Next up – train to Hangzhou…