The Conisbee weather jinx caught up with us today, and it rained in time for our cycle ride around the city wall. The city wall is 14 Km long, a perfect rectangle with 68 watch towers and 4 original gates. It has a couple of extra gates since the 1950s and has been rebuilt as often as Trigger's broom. Outside the city wall are many tall apartment blocks, but inside there are no buildings higher than 3 storeys. Again, most are not older than 40 years as they have...

The Terracotta Army visitor centre is an hour's drive out of the city along a wide tree lined motorway. Tony, our guide, explained that the regional government in Xian realises that the environment is important, so factories have been moved out of the centre and the air quality here is better than in Beijing. We saw huge building sites, apartments being built. The pits containing the warriors are huge, photos and TV don't convey the size. We bought the book, whi...

We flew out of the Beijing smog into Xian fog. Not nearly so thick, and not making us wheeze. Our guide here is Tony, and our hotel is smack bang in the centre of the old walled city, with fantastic service and we've been upgraded to a suite, which is very posh. We have a sofa, a chaise, an office chair and desk, an easy chair...have to keep moving round! We found the street market, complete with cauldrons set in tables so diners can cook their own food. We saw ...