Friday : sunny then showers

We had a good sleep our room was nice and quiet the beds and pillows are back to being hard like a rock though.

We had to change rooms today, so we got up and packed up then went to have breakfast.

We made good use of our Vegemite again, we have given up on going out and finding a Chinese restaurant for breakfast. I don't think the Chinese do breakfast, and if they do they just have dinner meals for breaky. Also this hostel has a good list of coffees and finally a good price $3.

We then did some thinking about catching another plane instead of the train. We were heading down to Chengdu tomorrow it was either take an hour flight or a 16hr overnight train. The price difference between the two is $50. We chose the plane again. We then moved our bags to our new room and went to go find a flight agent that was listed in or book.

Well we couldn't find the booking office but we found three others. Two of them had identical prices and were much cheaper than my net price. Giving us more reason to fly being only $20 more expensive than the train.

b***** thing was that we needed our passports to buy the tickets and we left them back at the hotel so we had to go back and get them. It was an hour return walk back to the flight agent no point getting a cab in this city the traffic is awful. on our walk we noticed a nice restaurant that we will have to go to tonight.

We got our tickets and then made our way to the bus station which is next to the train station.

We are off to go see another big famous Chinese attraction today. The Terra-cotta Warriors, and we were catching a local bus to get there. They frequently leave the station.

Once at the station it was a crazy sight people were everywhere, lying down on the ground with all sorts of luggage waiting for their train. Felt like we were back at a Vietnam train station, strange because all the big train stations we had previously been to in china had plenty of seating. Glad we bought our planes tickets now.

We found our bus, after asking a random, there was a small line but we should get on the next bus. The next bus came but the driver said to take another bus. He pointed to our new bus, so we went over and asked were it was going. It was also going to the warriors, still not sure why the other driver told us to take the other bus, when he was going there himself.

We got on the bus and away we went. I wasn't able to have a nap this time because the people behind us didn't stop talking. It was an hour drive and we had a change buses halfway. It's so funny we have no idea where we are going some times, and how we get there.

We got to the site bought our entry tickets and then hopped in a golf cart to take us to the main gate.

There are three Pits to choose from we went to pit one first. Wow was my first impression, we had to walk up along a raised platform to view to dig site. It was awesome, they're full size models of the real life army of back in the day. They used standard 6 face moulds and then used clay to add the additional facial features. They made up identical uniforms down to the rank and position of each soilder very cool.

We spent 45min walking around pit one, and we could see people working still digging up remains and sticking the broken warriors back together.

Next was pit two, it was a different pit largely still uncovered. The inprints in the dirt from the timber logs used to make the roofs to cover the warriors were still visible. As well as the remains of chariots horses and more soldiers. It looked like a battle field, there were arms and heads everywhere. We learnt about the different types of soilders and ranks from the displays laid out around the building.

Pit three was much smaller than the other Pits, the warriors were in good condition much like pit one. The difference between pit one and three was that all the soldiers were positioned outwards, not lined up in their ranks. Pit three was also the battle head quarters, due to the large number of high ranked officers in the pit.

After visiting all the pits we went back to pit one for a second look, and the place was empty. We could take the time to look at lots of different soldiers through the big lens on or camera. It was good to be left alone there, thats happened a few times on our trip so far. The Chinese and Vietnamese get up early to do their sight seeing, so sometimes it's good to do something else in the morning and go sight seeing in the arvo when the crowds are not as big.

It was after 6pm when we left pit one, we made our way back out to the buses. The exit route is different to the entry's, the pathway takes you through an ally full of restaurants and souvenir stores. It seemed like it was setup to accommodate a lot of people. We picked up a set of miniature Terra-cotta Warrior's. Then continued to the bus.

The bus ride was fine I was able to nap this time, and we didn't have to change buses either.

We got back to Xian station a bit after 7:30 and the station was crazier than ever. It had rained and no longer were people spread out over the open area. They were all trying to cram in underneath a bridge where it was dry.

We gladly moved on towards our nice cozy restaurant. We took a seat and the waitress hesitantly came over to give us the menu. I felt something was up by her actions, yep no English at this place. We resorted to using Kim's translator app on her phone. We typed in beef and rice, we already knew how to say beer. That's exactly what we got too, a plate of roast beef which was delicious and two plates of fried rice. We had everyone watching us eat as usual, people even peering in through the restaurants windows. I found the soy/vinegar sauce to be a perfect touch to the beef, maybe I enjoyed it too much and used too much of the sauce, because Kim noticed an old woman pointing and shaking her head at me, not sure but what ever it was a good meal.

On the walk back to the hostel, we heard a lot of crackers going off, we have been noticing them a lot everywhere actually. We have never managed to see them though, I think they may be for China's Autumn festival. It's an old Chinese holiday it started as a small family gathering with a husband remembering his wife or something like that won't get into it. Now it's probably just about crackers and moon cake, I must try some moon cake.

Back at the hostel we went straight to our rooms got cleaned up, and started to watch the book of Eli. Kim drifted off to sleep soon after it started. I had all sorts of dramas trying to sleep, most of the problems were caused by noisy drunk smelly back packers, making all sorts racket going back to their rooms. I watched another three movies before I got some Kip, It was close to 3am when I drifted off. Doesn't matter not much planed for tomorrow just do a bit of a city walk. It's ment to rain tomorrow as well.