Today was Xi’an day – a walled city near the famous Terracotta Warriors that I visited way back in 2007 with my brother and his family and my best friend and his family. The 317km, 6hr drive was smooth and blessed with great roads. We passed through the extensive thickly forested valleys that led back to the Maijishan Mountain Grottoes. The infrastructure spectacle also continued with magnificent tunnels and elevated roads cutting level through multiple mountain valleys. These valleys then dissipated and rest of the drive was quite un-inviting with continuous cities, factories and farms. Amazing. You quickly realise that this country has in fact over a billion people by the sheer number of large cities that you pass, all with skyscraper apartment buildings and all in the middle of nowhere !!!
Xi’an is nothing like I remember it. Big, sprawling and modern !!! Even the bit inside the 13.2km wall looks like a modern city. It was a stinking hot 32C when we arrived at 1pm and I dreaded my run on the wall immediately after in such heat and humidity but I had no choice. The wall opens at 8am and tomorrow morning we were bound for the Terracotta Warriors at 730am. So off I went. By the time I started my run on the wall around 2pm it was 34C and I quickly felt. Stopped a few times to take photos and buy water. I was soaked in sweat and exhausted by the time I returned to the North Gate only to have to face shopping for supplies straight after so I could rest up without having to go back out into this debilitating heat. It took me 82min to run the 13.2km – the heat held me back from my usual pace. I was glad to run this iconic wall for the second time in my life since 2007 !!! Shopping was even harder since I was smelly and very tired. Managed to find wine in some of the small convenience stores since there are no large western-style supermarkets inside the wall. Returning to a cold air-conditioned hotel room with a cool shower and plenty of soap was divine. Settled down to wine and movie before the big day tomorrow – terracotta day !!!
I walked around the inside of the walled Xi’an at 3pm the next day after visiting the Terracotta Warriors in the morning. I saw the following attractions: The City Wall, Bell Tower, Drum Tower, The Great Mosque, Muslim Bazaar. I was too tired from the Warriors to see more as you will find out once you read about Xi’an and see what I saw.
Xi'an (Pop 13.17m. Elev 405m) is the 6th most populous city in China, founded in the 3rd Century BC when China was unified by the Qin Dynasty. Known as Chang'an throughout much of its history, Xi'an is one of China's Four Great Ancient Capitals, having held the position under several of the most important dynasties in Chinese history and home of the famous Terracotta Army (Warriors). The city was one of the terminal points on the Silk Road during the ancient and medieval eras, as well as the home of the 3rd Century BC Terracotta Army commissioned by Emperor Qin Shi Huang, both of which are listed as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO. As a result, it is now the second-most popular tourist destination in China. Since the 1980s, Xi'an has matured into a cultural, industrial, political and educational, and research and development hub. Xi'an is home to several Universities and one of the world's top 100 financial centres.
Xi’an is also famous for the Weiyang Palace or "Never Ending Palace". Weiyang Palace was the largest palace ever built on Earth in 200BC, covering 4.8 square kilometres (1,200 acres), which is 6.7 times the size of the current Forbidden City and 11 times the size of the Vatican City.
The original Xi'an city wall was started in 194 BC and took 4 years to finish. Upon completion, the wall measured 25.7 km (15.97 mi) in length and 12 to 16 m (39.37–52.49 ft) in thickness at the base, enclosing an area of 36 km2 (13.90 sq mi). Over time it was damaged and rebuilt and now 13.2km along the top.
Please now enjoy what I saw inside the Xi’an walled city…
Now back to the Warriors. Departed at 730am to drive the short 39km out to a huge 64 square kilometre compound officially called “The Mausoleum Complex of China’s First Emperor”. Most people do not realise that the Terracotta Warriors are simply the side act to the burial gorund of the most famous Chinese person: Qin Shi Huang (259 – 210 BC), the first emperor of China. There is a brief explanation of the warriors and what is to be found in this place at the end of this post.
We arrived at this complex at 830am and left at 2pm. I reckon half of China was here because in all that time here, I must have spent only 90min actually looking at the antiquities. The rest of the time was spent queuing and waiting to see things in a sea of people. Nothing like what I remember in 2007. In fact, the official average daily attendance is now 65,000 people !!! It is so crowded that they had to move the two ancient chariots from a room next to the warriors to its own location 500m away in a huge concrete building that was opened in 2011 and this is even packed. The chariots are half the real life sizes but what makes them amazing is that they were put together from over 3,000 smashed pieces of clay !!! Once again, what I saw was the highlight of China so far (and probably by the end of the trip) but not the “experience” – that was the worst. People were literally climbing over each other to view the warriors. I visited the three warrior pits with Pit 1 being the classic large one like an aircraft hangar with hundreds of warriors in it. By the time I finished climbing over people, pushing and shoving to bring you the nest shots – I was more exhausted than running the Xi’an wall !!! I was happy to get back to Xi’an but struggled to shoot the rest of this city from 330pm to 6pm due to my warrior exhaustion and the peak 35C heat and humidity of the afternoon. I found more wine and a terrific dinner of garlic spinach, cauliflower salad and spring onion pie to help me recover.
Behold the fruits of me climbing over people and spending hours of editing to eliminate the words of people from one of the greatest antiquity discoveries in history…
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Sun 29JUN presented us with a solid 523km and 8hrs of driving to get to Pingyao. The drive was very smooth and pleasant with great roads and cooler breezes given elevations around 500-1,000m. We passed several gorge valleys with stepped farms on the slopes. The remainder of the drive was mostly the same flat open landscape of mostly farms. One strange feature was driving through a huge lone saddle mountain in the middle of a huge open flat plain – why did the Chinese build a bridge into and out of this saddle and through it instead of just going around it ? Because they love building things !!! And they are good at it !!!
We arrived at the North Gate of the walled old town at 5pm and with a free day tomorrow to run the wall and visit this smaller space, I decided to take the afternoon off and rest. William and I made the trip to the only mini convenience store that sold wine and we found an excellent restaurant serving the best fat-free beef I have eaten to date. It is strange but the Chinese prefer to eat their beef cold and they love dried meat (like South African Biltong). They sell dried meat everywhere, even at petrol stations. I must have done something right because the tour leader, Brett assigned me to the “honeymoon suite” – the biggest room in the hotel with a bed sporting bed posts and a covering like I was King Faruk !!! Enjoyed it very much.
Pingyao is at 780m and much milder than Xi’an so I decided to sleep in to 830am before my run. Good decision. It was only 24C when I set out to run the wall. Much to my surprise, when I got to the ticket office for the wall they told me I could enter for free. I knew that 60 and over was free but I was 59. Then I realised that the Chinese calculate their ages like the Greeks in Greece !!! If you “enter” your 60th year then you are 60 !!! No complaints from me because I visited the wall 3 times later that day for photos and a number of temples, all for free !!! I was happy to be 60 in China. The wall run went well. 6.13km in total so I ran it twice to give me my 10km minimum. It was quite awesome to be running on a wall that was built 2800 years ago !!! Who would have thought that my legs would be pounding these bricks all those years later… After my run I decided to clean the truck windows for the very last time given that we would be in Beijing in 4 days. I set out at noon to visit this ancient city under heavy cloud and humid conditions.
Pingyao (Pop 442,785. Elev 780m) is like a mini Xi’an with its own walled old town but with a difference. Unlike Xi’an, there are no modern buildings inside its walled old town – just the original old buildings, most restored of course but not replaced. Its wall and interior is half the size of Xi’an measuring only 6km all the way around. The modern city of Pingyao was founded in the 14th Century AD and by the 16th century, it was a regional financial hub. The old town or ancient city of Pingyao was first built during the reign of King Xuan of Zhou (827-782 BC) and has a history of more than 2800 years. In 1197 the entire old town became UNESCO protected.
Pingyao is easy to visit and easy to walk. It has the feel of a small town despite it being surrounded by a modern city with skyscraper apartments. The architecture is distinctly Chinese and most buildings are adorned with the stereotypical red lanterns. I found that the best architectural features were inside the courtyards of the buildings having entered many out of curiosity. The food specialty of Pingyao is coloured and sculpted dumplings and a soft desert bun soaked in honey (see photo below). I visited the following attractions: West Gate, The Wall, Mayors Office, Minhou Temple, Confucian Temple, Nine Dragons Wall, East Gate, West Gate, Catholic Church, Qingxu Temple. The weather then turned and it began to sprinkle so I sped up my touring. Around 3pm, I heard thunder while I was in the Qingxu Temple and not long after the heavens opened up and it poured with gusts of wind. Lucky for me the temple was big and I huddled in a corner to wait the rain out. After 15min I gave up and ran back to the hotel arriving soaked. Nothing that a hot shower could not fix and I knew that the aircon would dry my wet clothes overnight. That night I shouted Brett and William dinner at the same place as the night before. Plenty of dishes and plenty of “Cha Cha”, the local distilled rice wine that tastes like Italian or Spanish Grappa !!! 53% thank you very much and confirmed the following morning !!! Here are the fruits of a good day in Pingyao…
THE TERRACOTTA ARMY IN A NUTSHELL
The Terracotta Army is a collection of terracotta sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang (259 – 210 BC), the first emperor of China. They are situated in a huge 64 square kilometre complex called “The Mausoleum Complex of China’s First Emperor” in a place called Linton County just 39km from the city of Xi’an. The Army is a form of funerary art buried with the emperor in 210–209 BC with the purpose of protecting him in his afterlife. The figures were discovered in 1974 by local farmers digging a well. The figures vary in height according to their rank, the tallest being the generals. The most amazing fact is that no two warriors look alike – they all have different faces !!! Other terracotta figures include: chariots, weapons and horses. Estimates from 2007 were that the three pits containing the Terracotta Army hold more than 8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots, 700 weapons and 670 horses, the majority of which remain in situ in the pits near Qin Shi Huang's mausoleum, which is under a huge plant covered pyramidal mound, which the government does not want to excavate out of respect. Other, non-military terracotta figures have since been found in other pits, including those of officials, acrobats, strongmen, and musicians. Work on the Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum started in 246BC when Qin was made emperor at age 13 and took 700,000 workers a whopping 38 years to build and finished 3 years after the emperor died. The Terracotta warriors are made of terracotta, a type of fired clay, not of human remains but they do represent real soldiers. Instead, the emperor did bury alive his concubines. The mausoleum contains numerous small burial pits, some containing the remains of young women, suggesting they were killed elsewhere and then buried in the pits. The Terracotta Army has NOT been completely excavated. While over 2,000 life-sized terracotta figures and horses have been unearthed from three burial pits since its discovery in 1974, estimates suggest there may be around 8,000 in total. Many more figures and the emperor's tomb itself remain buried, with ongoing excavation focusing on areas that can be studied and preserved with current technology. This is indeed a momentous find and known unofficially as “The 8th Wonder of the World” !!!
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