Too many trains!!!

We've noticed that a lot of the sights in China have an inappropriate Disneyesque feel to them. The Great Wall was littered with theme park style attractions such as a cable car to take you up and a Luge track to get you back down (some parts of the wall even have a zip-line!). Nearby 'Gift shops' were selling cheap Obama dressed as a communist T-shirts (who needs Mickey Mouse!) as well as popular slogans such as 'I heart BJ' – being of course Beijing... Most recently we went to an original section of the city wall in Nanjing that has a city gate of great historic significance. What we found was loads of carnival stalls blocking the entrance and really fake plastic statues throughout. None of which seem to be in keeping with the historical significance but the Chinese seem to love it!

We finished up in Pingyao by taking a trip to the Wang Family Courtyard (the Chinese equivalent of a impressive stately home) and visiting the Underground Castle. The Underground Castle is about 10 kilometers worth of tunnels underneath a small walled village built to protect against invaders. We hired an English speaking guide called Lily for Y40 (£4) as we didn't want to get lost underground in the dark and only about a kilometer worth of tunnels have been safely reinforced – plus Lilly amused Kat by saying 'willage' instead of village for the whole tour. It was really interesting to wonder through the tunnels and hear about all the traps that were set up across 3 levels, even if they were never put to use as the site was never invaded!

From Pingyao we caught a sleeper train to Xi'an which got us in at about 6am. We checked into the hostel and half-asleep went in search of the city walls with Hannah who we had met a few days ago on the train to Pingyao. Once we found the city walls and climbed up them (this took much longer than it should have thanks to my map reading!) we hired a tandem bike and set off to cycle all of its 14 kilometers within the 100 minutes that we had paid for. It certainly woke us up and it was great fun! We then finished the day by walking past the Drum and Bell Towers and visiting the Muslim quarter which had tiny streets stuffed with stalls selling all kinds of food and The Great Mosque which is a temple complex with a combination of Chinese and Muslim architecture.

The next day we then caught the bus to the Terracotta Warriors. We had spoken to quite a few people that had said they were disappointed by this sight but we both thought it was absolutely fantastic and one of the best things we've done in China so far. Truly 'epic' is an appropriate word to describe the aircraft hanger sized area pit 1 occupies. Seeing all those life-sized warriors lined up in rows is very, very impressive!

It was a long train journey to Nanjing the day after the Warriors. We left at 11am and arrived at 3am. We had to get a taxi to our hostel and when bartering with a taxi driver he gathered some of his friends around him, repeated a price Kat had said and they all went "Phwa-ha-ha-ha" like evil bond villains! Once we walked off his tone sobered and he agreed to our price…

In Nanjing we went to the Nanjing memorial museum that detailed the rape and pillage of the city in an unprovoked attack by the Japanese in 1937. It was quite brutal with very graphic pictures of the Chinese being executed – not one for the kids! It was interesting if a little bit biased as they left out any mention that the Nanjing council locked the common people of Nanjing in their city walls (whilst running away themselves) so they could become 'hardened like jade' from the attack. Over 300,000 people died.

We also went to the Purple Mountain (hills) in Nanjing which was a nice break from the city life as everything was green! There were of course still thousands of Chinese tour groups…

Yesterday we caught another train (yes we're really sick of them now!) to Hangzhou. This time it was a day time train so we booked hard seats, which are actually pretty comfy. The train was two hours late. When we arrived at Hangzhou no buses to our hostel were running so we had to get a taxi. We found out after a long queue that metered taxis ignore white people! All of them that wound down their windows shook their heads and drove off when we told them where we wanted to go. We managed to get a taxi from a train station tout that didn't have a taxi sign for about a pound more than we should have paid – I suppose we know now for next time.

Hangzhou is a great place with a lovely big lake right in the middle of it. Today we walked around the lake, climbed (well got the escalator and glass lift up!) a giant pagoda and saw a yellow dragon waterfall! Whilst it is still busy there were little pockets of emptiness where we were the only ones in sight! It's really picturesque and I think its helping us unwind from some of the stress of the big cities.

Next after another day in Hangzhou we're heading to Suzhou (by bus!) which has lots of pretty gardens then we'll be arriving to Shanghai by a half hour train journey. Instead of our original plan to catch a 44 hour train to Chengdu on the other side of the country we've splashed out and bought a plane ticket so that it will now take us a cool 3 hours instead!

Love C&K. x