China! Day 9 part e

The City Wall of Xī'ān! Enjoy a few more photos. Tomorrow the TerraCotta Warriors!

China! Day 9 part d

While in the Wild Goose Pagoda Park, we had a calligraphy lesson. Fascinating to learn a few of the 6000 the Chinese characters and what they mean. After lunch Mark and I skipped the Jade factory tour. We had a wild hair to go back to the city wall, rent a bike and circumnavigate the top of the wall on a bike. Only 13.7k, felt like 137k. It really was a long way around. Had to put a 100 Yuen deposit on the bike, which is about 15 USD....the bikes were not worth that much. We managed to get them to roll all way around. The whole adventure took about 3 hours. Should have been less but it took us an hour to make a 20 minute walk to the wall from our hotel. We kinda got lost in the underground street crossings. Oh well, saw a lot more of the city than originally planned....

China! Day 9 part c

Wandered the park after our brief introduction to Tai Chi. Enjoy photos of this UNESCO world heritage site, Wild Goose Pagoda.

China! Day 9 part b

Wild Goose Pagoda and park built in 652 originally built with 5 stories and later in 704 rebuilt to its current height. It was the tallest structure in the city for many centuries. The functions of this pagoda were many. Mostly used to hold sutras and figurines of Gautama Buddha brought to China from India by the Buddhist monk, Xuanzang. The park was full of people active in many activities. We were greeted by a Tai Chi 7th level master. He performed one of the ancient forms of Tai Chi. Of course it was not just a demonstration, we all got up and attempted to mirror his movements. Good thing we have no pictures nor video. Only. Still shot with the master. Whew...

China! Day 9 part a

Xi'an! Fascinating ancient city. One of Athens oldest of the four ancient Capitals through. 13 dynasties. This is longer then the time Beijing has been the capital. This city is the starting point for the Silk Road and home if the Terra-cotta Army if the Emperor Qin Shi Huang. We know heads the Terra-cotta Warriors. This is also the only city in which the fortifications Wallis intact and its original location. It was built under the rule of the Hongwu Emperor in the 14th century. We briefly visited the wall before our bus took us off to our next adventure.

China! Day 8

Bye bye Beijing, hello Xian. City number 3 and new adventures to be had. We experienced significantly extensive security in the Beijing airport in our efforts to get on the plane to Xian. Only a few bags were searched and people lost a few items. Fortunately no person was taken into the back room for questioning. Whew. Tonight we walked around the inner city of Xian. A much smaller city compared to Shanghai and Beijing, only about 10 million people. We strolled down the "eat street" of Xian. Kinda like being at the state fair with an obvious exception...none of the signage at our fair is in Chinese. ☺️. It was fun to see the drum and bell towers along with all the city light all lit up at night. It is an interesting feeling when the locals are taking our picture with their phones. Not many non Chinese in these crowds. Tomorrow, more exploration.

China! Day 7 part a

> The Great Wall! What a thrill it was to visit!! The Great Wall of China is the collective name of a series of fortification systems to protect and consolidate the territories of China. The defensive lines contain multiple stretches of ramparts, trenches, ditches, as well as individual fortresses. Parts of this structure date back to 221 b.c. It is 13,171 miles long and the largest man made structure in the world. Today we scaled the Badaling section. Not the best restored or beautiful but the least crowded. Had to contend with hoards of people the last two days. Whew, today not so much. A few of our group successfully reached past the 3rd tower and a few nearly to the 4th tower. A more accurate description to trek this wall would a be it's few degrees short of vertical steps. Seriously steep but rewarding to be on the wall and traverse some of its terrain. Totally excited to be here and experience this world wonder.
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