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Sat 12th,Did'nt need the screaming girls to wake us up this morning we were ready for action by 7am,got a taxi and on our way to the train station to catch the 7.45 train to our next destination Pingyao,not sure what it is with us but we always seem to get the dodgey taxi men,this one did'nt get out of 2nd gear and was swaying about all over the road eating some bird seed and getting the horn from other drivers nether mind he got us there in one piece,settled down with the locals and met a nice chinese lady called Li Yougying,after a few minutes she had a word with the guard and we were moved to the less crowded part of the carriage,10 mins later Ying joined us which helped the time go as we were chatting all the journey,only down side was the selfish gits who were smoking in our non smoking carriage,got really busy about an hour from Pingyao with people standing in the aisles,arrived just after 3,as soon as we got out there he was the dodgey taxi man(not the 1 from Da Tong)hasslling us,our hostel that we booked had a free pick up from the station so I phoned them but could'nt get through,the taxi man said he had there number so rang it and I spoke to a bloke who said it's ok go with him,all done,we got into a rickshaw(1st time for us,and spooky)crafty git had dropped us off at a different hostel but it all worked out ok,nice hostel in the heart of the town,had a walk round,it's a really old place with no new buildings,got back and had some dinner then I had a foot exfoliation,a little Chinese man comes to the room washes your feet in what smelled like ginger water and then scrapes all the tough and dry skin off your feet,works wonders I think but will find out for sure tomorrow,another tour booked this time to see an underground castle.
Sun 13th,Met up with another new person this morning Lisa from California(the 3rd person we have met from there)a lawyer working in Shanghi,difficult arranging trips on your own its not worth thier while so the 4 of us set off in a 7 seater to The Wang family courtyard,you go through an impresive entrance and go through many arches and doors that lead to small courtyards, they look good but after about the 5/6 door you realise they all look the same,1 or 2 rooms are slightly different,there is a castle attatched by a bridge but the access was closed maybe due to the snow and ice on the bridge(snow and ice Ali,so no I hav'nt got a good tan YET)in between the courtyard and the castle there is a small village called the cave dwellings built into the hills,people still live in them today,back into our little bus and onto the Zhangbi underground castle,a fascinating 1400 year old network of defence tunnels built at the end of the Sui Dynasty origionally built against possible attack from Tang-Dynasty invaders luckily in one way it was never used but it was a lot of hard work with over 1500m of tunnels on 3 levels the deepest going down to 26m,it fell into disrepair but re-opened in 2005,nowadays it's agood tourist attraction,we booked an English speaking guide with a great name Stephen of course,without him I think you could easily get lost in the dark and without a torch,but also he knew everything about the tunnels,the tunnels lead up to the old village of Zhangbi Cun,few old temples and lots of little allye's a bit like coranation st,met some of the local kids who find it funny to keep saying hello but good as gold,back for some more chinese treatment,I had the cupping,they put these plastic suction cups on your back in 7 different places which stretches your skin,it draws out your toxins and your impurities,was funny because Jamie was in the next bed getting his feet done, exfoliation then massaged so he was laughing at me then it was my turn to laugh at him when she was cracking his toes,I am now left with 7 massive love bites on my back,lucky no one will see them by the time the sun comes out,good experience though,catching the 12.30 bus to Xian today(Mon),oddly the bus takes 6/7hrs and the train takes 11hrs so another form of travel for us.
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