Unique Places in Xi'an

Around the huge area encircled by the walls, a modern city seems to match the development seen in the other big cities of China.

Concentrated in the interior of the old town, and the external highlights (terracotta warriors and tombs) we had no time to explore that part of the city, only having of it a general idea caught from the bus.

Two days is really a short time to a detailed visit.

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The room is large and beautiful. People sit around tables, in a mix of theatre and restaurant that announces noise and movements during the show.

Imagine that, reading the list, you state: Port wine. It can't be serious!
Being Portuguese, of course I tried to laugh about the thing, investigating what the hell they call “Port wine”. Can you imagine?
Well, it was… Port wine. Portuguese. True and honest!
A good company for a noisy and agitated show, I thought.
WRONG!
Eating drinking and talking was BEFORE the show. When it started, the silence was respectful, and we could enjoy each detail, including the nice set of musician ladies in a box, the colours, the dances, the music, the Port…

TANG DINASTY SHOW. Great!

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Everywhere in China, people work hard to recover touristy spots.

That was mainly seen in Beijing, but also in Xi’an. Many monuments exhibit covered facades, but also there are works on-going with visitors around.

The Big Wild Goose Pagoda was no exception, but the disturbing to the visitors was minimum.

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When you visit the Terra-cotta Warrior site you are driven from the car park to the museums by golf cart. As you drive you pass a lovely park on your left. After your visit, the preferred option is for you to walk back through the avenue of shops. Our local guide was kind to us and took us back through this lovely, peaceful park.

There was a large grassy area studded with Ginko trees and a path that wound in and out of flowering May Bush and Dog Roses and beds of Irises. It was a great way to finish our visit in amongst the perfumed flowers buzzing with honey bees.

If you are with a local guide ask them to take you this way.

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I spent my last day of 2007 in a uncommon way,. Climbing a mountain in a chilly winter day. It’s a forest park in Qinlin Mountains, 74 km west of Xi’an. The space of the park is over 2600 ha. Based on different views, the park is made of five areas, including 3100 meter height peak, pastures, waterfalls, streams and red birch woods. It’s better to visit the park in spring, summer and fall. It’s one of the most popular resorts around Xi’an, because it’s much cooler and quiet. People can stay in the park and search every spot in 2 days.

Though it’s not a good season to visit the park, I enjoyed the views I saw, blue sky, frozen waterfalls, snow covered paths and flying hawks.

Anytime, the temperature here is at least 5 degrees lower than of Xi’an. So, bringing an extra coat and a pot of hot coffee are good idea, otherwise you’ll catch a cold like me did.

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A highlight of this trip was Famen Si (Temple), approx. 120 km west of Xi’an. The temple and museum were amazing, and it was not overrun with tourists. We did not see any other caucasians at the temple, and most other people seemed to be there to pray.

In 147 AD, King Asoka of India distributed Buddhist relics to Buddhist colonies throughout Asia to atone for his warlike life. The Famen Si was built to house the finger bone of Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism. Emperors in the Sui (581 - 618) and Tang (618 - 907) Dynasties believed that worshipping the bones of Sakyumi would bring riches and peace to the land, and made offerings of treasure, kept near the bones housed in a crypt below the 13-tiered stupa (pagoda). After the fall of the Tang Dynasty, the bones and treasures were forgotten until 1987, when renovations began on the stupa.

A museum was built to house the treasures from the Tang Dynasty, and a new vault was built below the stupa to store the finger bones. The bones are watched over by a chanting monk and they are protected by the equivalent of the door to a bank vault.

Our Lonely Planet guidebook advised to take the 8 am bus, so we arrived at the station at 7:35 and boarded the bus...only to discover that it did not leave at 8. It would leave when it was full. By the time we left at 8:35 I was already tired of sitting on the bus and dreading the 3 hour ride to the temple. What a pleasant surprise when it only took 2 1/2 hours! With the combined efforts of the bus driver and fellow passengers we learned that the first bus back to Xi’an left at 1 pm and the last at 3 pm...and that they left when they were full. Needless to say, we did not risk missing the last bus, and arrived back in Xi’an in time to wander in the Muslim Quarter.

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Because Xi'an was the capitol of China for over 1000 years, the countryside around the city contains dozens of tomb sites of emperors and other nobles. Many of them are earthen mounds, often in the shape of a pyramid. Almost none have been excavated to date. On the drive in from the airport to Xi'an, you can see a couple of them off in the distance amidst the fields. The largest pyramid is the tomb of emperor Qin Shi Huangdi of the Qin dynasty, which is guarded by the famous terra cotta army.

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This real village outside Xi'an is not widely known, and as it is where people live, is only open to a few visitors.
Leaving our bus near some modern houses, we walked up a rough road to a brickworks using clay cut from a hill nearby. Stacks of bricks were drying in the sun, waiting to be fired in the kilns, others were being loaded on to carts to be taken away. Passing this, we continued up hill at first passing walls. We were invited, by arrangement, into one of the yards, where we found a brick outhouse containing fuel and an enormous wok, fanned by bellows. The moth of the cave was bricked over, but inside there was a main room, with curtained off beds, a small living area complete with television and bread loaves proving, and a cave at the back for storage.
Further up, houses were not walled off, and, near the caves used for housing animals there was the primitive village well, which only had a little water left.