Killing time in Xi'an

So, even though Xi'an wouldn't have been my first choice to spend an extra week in China, I still managed to occupy my time and enjoy myself.

I first amused myself by catching the 4th cold of my trip. Yes, that's right, the 4th one. It was loads of fun, I assure you. I can safely say that I wasn't a very popular dorm mate for the first few days, what with all the nose blowing, coughing fits and cold-induced snoring that even woke me up...

I also took advantage of this break to get started on a Harry Potter obsession that has only just finished today. Since I was going to be in Xi'an a while, I decided to visit the English language book store for some books. I haven't been reading much lately, too busy I guess :-), but a nice book would be a good way to pass some time I thought. I first bought book #3 in the series, thinking that I'd only read the first 2, only to discover after the first 2 chapters that not only had I already read the book, but seen the movie as well! I guess the title just wasn't memorable to me. It was an interesting challenge to return the book and try to explain all of this to the Chinese clerk, but I managed and left the shop with book #4 with me. Books #5 and #6 were bought and read in Beijing, while book #7 I bought 2 days ago on my arrival in Hong Kong. I'm feeling a bit bereft this morning, as I just finished the last book. I now can't wait to see the movies...

Between a lot of reading and blowing my nose, I also managed to get in a bit more sightseeing in the area. I spent one entertaining day visiting another Emperor's tomb in the area. This Emperor was not quite as 'grandiose' as Qin #1 of the Terracotta Warrior fame, as he had himself buried with an army of 2-foot tall soldiers instead of the life size version. The museum and archaeological site surrounding the tomb was very interesting and a lot quieter to visit than the Terracotta Warriors.

But my favorite day-trip of all was visiting one of China's 'Sacred Mountains' called Mt. Huashan. I went there with a couple from Montreal (Michelle and Pierre) that I met at the hostel in Xi'an. By the way, I had the most 'Quebecer sightings' while in Xi'an, by far. At my hostel only, I met 3 different couples as well as 1 solo guy, all from Quebec, which is more than the whole of South East Asia I think! But back to Mt. Huashan. I had seen some incredible pictures of the mountain at the hostel and was looking forward to going there. I knew there was a cable car that brought you to the top of the mountain, so I thought my day would be spent slowly and gently walking around the top of the mountain, taking a few pictures and then heading back. I was sooo wrong. It turns out that yes, there is a cable car that brings you to the top of the mountain, but then there are many different peaks you can walk to, all with amazing views of the mountain and surrounding area. Being a very popular sacred mountain with the Chinese, they've built stone and concrete steps to every peak for the tourists to use. As I got off the cable car, we saw a path to one of the peaks and started climbing the steps. It's a good thing that I didn't know how many steps were involved before I started out that morning, cause I don't think I would have been able to face it. Around 2000 steps later (!!!) and I was done in. I managed to climb to the West Peak and South Peak and got to see some very impressive views. Made even more impressive by the effort it me took to get my butt up there!

I visited Mount Huashan on the day of the earthquake. I've told everyone that I didn't really feel it on that day, but I got a weird feeling on the mountain at one point, that I've come to realise was the earthquake. As Michelle and I were coming down the steps heading back to the cable car, at one point my legs got very wobbly and I had trouble standing straight. I thought I was dizzy from the exertion, so I stopped for a few seconds to stabilize, but the feeling continued a few more seconds after that. Nothing dramatic, but I now realise this was the earthquake going through Huashan, more than 1000km away and 1600m up from the epicenter. I still feel very lucky to have missed it, after all the devastation and bad news coming out since it happened.

I did finally get my passport back, a whole 8 days after I arrived in Xi'an. Once I got it, I booked myself on the next train out of there, heading to Beijing...