Alfredo and I decided to go looking for tea (or dinner, to any uncivilised people out there); he had looked up the top place in Xi'an for those Chinese hamburgers, and it was only 12 minutes walk away! We got there successfully, but it was closed! Not to worry though, he had also looked up the second best place, and that was only about 10 minutes from the first one... but that wasn't closed, there was simply no trace of it having ever existed. Following this failure, we decided to just grab some from the first place we saw advertising, but there weren't any for ages (or at least, none with pictures. Our Chinese reading isn't so hot). Finally one appeared, and we leapt on it. Their English wasn't the best, but we got there eventually.
All that walking made us hungry though, so we stopped at a street stand for some sausages on sticks. We just wanted 2, but it seemed you had to fill the tub and get 6. Only 20 yuan though so that's ok. They weren't all sausages, there was some other stuff too, like little roundish balls, sticks with a square cross section, and the like. We went for a mix. Turns out that sausage wasn't sausage, it was crabstick type stuff. The roundish balls? Crabstick type stuff. The sticks with a squa... crabstick type stuff. It was ok, but Alfredo wasn't the biggest fan, so I ended up eating a lot of crabstick type stuff!
In the evening there was the option of a free light show outside the Large Wild Goose Pagoda, the largest in Asia. It was about an hour bus ride away, so we wouldn't be getting back until 10:30, but I decided to go for it, along with Alfredo, Julia, Simon (aka the Beijing Barger), and Christine. It was just one bus, so once we got seated it was alright. A middle aged Chinese lady started talking to us enthusiastically in fairly bad English, but she was very nice and pointed out all the things of interest we were passing.
We had some time to look around the very pleasant surroundings of the pagoda before the show started. You couldn't go inside at this late hour, but given the 35 yuan price tag, and uninspiring insides previous buildings, it probably wasn't worthwhile anyway. Walking round was entertaining enough; the pagoda looks really nice at night, there were statues, fancy street lamps and such to look at, and it was very busy, which gave the whole thing a festival atmosphere (even though the show is supposedly nightly)
Our first sight of the Big Wild Goose Pagoda
People getting ready to watch the show very photogenically
The Creation of Man crossed with Isaac Newton. The Creation of Apple?
We had scoped out the best place to watch the show whilst walking around (the location of the last photo). You get the pagoda in the background, and it was much quieter up this end than the other, where it was 4 people deep half an hour before the show even started! It was busy as I said, so we were on the third row, but everyone is really short (I've seen *loads* of people shorter than mum!), so I could see just fine.
The show was really nice, all sorts of different fountains, some of which had moving nozzles, and coloured lights. About halfway through though people started to leave. We were confused, but it was definitely good for us, so we didn't mind. We soon figured out why though, the grand finale was basically all fountains on at max power, which meant those in the front row got fairly wet. I hid behind a baby on it's father's shoulders though so I was mostly fine!
A pre show fountain. That photographer really lined it up well with the pagoda and the lights!
Many things were happening
I like how the water looks falling in this shot
The tall fountain was the best!
The finale was intense. My baby shield is just out of shot to the right.
Afterwards we got a taxi home, and then were quickly to bed. We'd already had a shower after all!
The next morning we went for breakfast to the same place as yesterday, which was fine by me. More steamed buns! It was a 7 o clock breakfast as we were going to cycle round the city walls, and wanted to do so before the day got too hot.
The Xi'an city walls are the most complete in china, evidenced by the fact you can cycle all the way round! It was built around the 1350s, and has 4 gates. It is also about 10-15 meters wide and quite flat, making it perfect for cycling. The total length is 17.4 kilometres, which took us about 1 and a half hours to cycle on the single gear bikes provided.
Another sun photo for Kathy
Each side had a different lamp-holder, the 4 directional beasts of Chinese mythology: dragon, phoenix, tiger, and xuanwu (dragon turtle). I missed the Phoenix because I didn't notice they'd changed!
The vintage Sporting Paraiso shirt makes yet another appearance abroad. It's seen 6 continents!
The wall is wide and long. Good job, I've got ptsd from Julie in Vietnam
I took a dangerous selfie. Not sure it was worth risking my life for
A Lama temple at one of the corners of the wall. I think they might be ok for money...
Haven't I seen you somewhere before?
We went for tea at a fancy place William knew. We got a private room with it's own bathroom, it was a super fancy place, but still only came out at 35 yuan (£5) each including beer! It wasn't a massive meal to be fair, but after a massive lunch it was just right. We had chicken and a variety of vegetables, plus some weird bread/donut crossover that William got insanely excited about when he saw on the menu.
The reason I haven't stopped writing yet is because we were getting another sleeper train tonight which would take 18 hours, meaning we only arrive in Emei Shan (pronounced Umay Shen) at 4pm. Not much point in doing a post for that day!
The train was older than the last we went on, but not half so hot, and the top bunks weren't so high, and had a ladder to get to them! Lucky me, as I volunteered for the top having got a bottom last time.
Simon (aka the Beijing Barger) and William somehow managed to coordinate their snoring to alternate, and I've got a bit of a sniffle, so getting to sleep wasn't easy, especially given the train stopped every 15 minutes, and Chinese people are not very polite so walked along the aisles basically shouting. I eventually dropped off though, and got an ok night's sleep in.
The next day there were some really nice views, and we passed the time chatting, blogging, reading, and laughing at Chinese tshirts with English writing. The train wasn't actually as bad as I was expecting, it was actually quite nice to have a day doing not much of anything!
The height of luxury
The views helped pass the time though
As did this guy. We created an elaborate plan to get a picture of his glorious tshirt
We arrived a little later than planned, at around 5pm: Chinese trains are pretty imprecise! We then got a short private bus to our monastery lodgings, but that is a story for another day.
Is that statue of usain bolt?
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