My evening flight from Beijing had brought me to Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia Province. Confusingly there are two Mongolia's. The country of Mongolia with its Capital Ulaan Bator, and the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia on the south that borders the country of Mongolia to the north. Even more confusing the chinese outer province is called 'inner' mongolia when it would make sense to be 'outer' mongolia to the main country.

I knew about Hohhot and Inner Mongolia from when I was looking at teaching jobs. One of the places that had positions and seemed interesting was Hohhot. It described itself as a mix of cultures, mongolian, buddhist, and Islamic with a variety of temples, architecture, and cuisine.

It seemed quite interesting except for the fact that the winters are very severe and long. For seven months it is below freezing with normal temperatures between -20 and -30 during the winter peak. There's no way I was going to live thru that but it was close enough to Korea that it easy to visit. Even in summer the weather is about 5 degrees cooler than beijing.

I asked my hostel for airport pickup and never got confirmation so was hoping there wasnt another drama like when I arrived at Beijing airport and the hostel there. Fortunately as soon as I left arrivals there were two people standing with my name waiting.

The one guy who drove the jeep spoke quite good english. The second one who sat in the back with me was a bit more limited. He is an agriculture student at the inner mongolia university but his english is a lot better than he was giving himself credit for as he was able to understand and form more sentences than my middle school students can.

We rode in the jeep listening to mongolian folk music and got to the hostel close to midnight. I think I had confused them with my booking. There are no private single rooms only doubles. To get a double you have to reserve and pay for two people, which I did so that I could have a private room for myself.

This confused them as they were expecting two people to arrive and I kept telling them we can leave the airport as no-one else was arriving. A double room is still only 160Y ($24) vs 80Y ($12) per person sharing a double so cheap enough for me to afford to book the whole room to myself.

I was supposed to do the overnight grasslands tour the morning after I arrived, but as I confused them into thinking I was two people, they said I had to wait one day till more guests arrive as they need a minimum of two persons. As I was in Hohhot for three days this was ok, just that I had to reverse my itinerary around.

I had forgot my towel in beijing so had to improvise and use one of my shirts as a towel from now on. The hostel staff who spoke english well were very helpful and gave me a map with bus numbers to important sites, as well as a local street map showing where the various bus stops are.

As soon as I left the hostel in the morning and started to walk to the bus stop I loved it here. This was a totally different feel from Beijing. People were not using the sidewalk and were walking on the sides of the street. So you had a mix of pedestrians, cyclists, motorbikes, with cars and taxis in the middle of the road.

I took the bus for 1Y (.15 cents) and the hostel had told me to count the number of bus stops to get off. The driver missed one stop so I only counted the ones he stopped at and got off one stop too late. Eventually I found my way to the Wu Ta Temple, or Five Pagoda Temple as its called.

Entrance was 35Y ($5.25), and is a series of outer buildings housing gold buddha statues and courtyards, that lead to the main five pagoda temple in the rear courtyard. The five pagado temple is built in Indian style and has detailed carvings all around each side. I didnt know you could go up a very narrow and steep staircase to overlook the complex.

When I came down some tourists tried to talk to me. I kept telling them 'english' which they didnt understand. I tried 'canada', 'england', 'america' which they didnt understand. Then I tried 'USA', 'new york', 'washington', still they were clueless. I dont think my pronounciation is that bad for them not to understand anything.

Then I was given directions to walk over to where the other temples are, about a 10 min walk. When you come off this road and turn onto the main street the architecture changes. All of the side roads from which I had been on have giant castle like arch doorways with coloured round mongolian domes. The first temple was very easy to find further up.

Outside the temple was a big plaza with a giant statue of Ghengis Khan mounted on a horse. Leading south were several tourist type streets like Qian Men Emperors Walk I had seen in Beijing Before. Here they were selling souvenir items such as water pouches, swords, knives. They also had animal pelts, and traditional hats.

After that I went into the temple for 30Y ($4.50). DaZhao Temple was actually a massive complex which you wouldnt realize from outside. There were many outer buildings and courtyards with gold buddha statues in the buildings similar to the five pagoda temple. This led to a large main building where there were prayer mats in filling the room and a shrine on the far wall.

You could walk around the inside perimeter wall of the hall to the back and around again. There was a line of upright gold cylinders which people were spinning as they walked. At the rear it led to another chamber with massive and very old buddhist statues. There were monks in their praying.

The complex had many monks walking in different types of dress based on position. There were dorms where they lived including children. There were also large incense fires which were quite hot. Some of the indoor giant gold statues were at least three stories high and reminded me of Japan.

Across the road facing is another temple XilituZhao. Entrance was again 30Y ($4.50). This one was more deserted and had few visitors though similar layout. The artwork was a bit more worn and dated and they were less fussy about taking pictures. They also had giant white stupas outside dressed in many coloured pieces of paper, which may be wishes left by visitors.

These three temples were really amazing, a short distance from each other, and surprising for what you'd expect in China. They are of a more unique character than typical chinese temples and a mix of tibetan and japanese. I think entrance fees should be highest for the second one DaZhao since it was the largest and most elaborate.

Next I would head up to the muslim quarter for lunch and the main mosque so that will be a seperate entry as too many pictures just in one day.