Xi'an and the City Wall

Let me start by saying that it is a very long journey to Xi'an, China from my home outside of Denver, CO. It is a 2+ hour flight from Denver to San Francisco, 12+ hours from San Francisco to Beijing, and then about 1.5 hours from Beijing to Xi'an. If you include lead times and lay-over times at the airports, this adds up to about 24 hours of travel. So including the time/date change, we departed Denver at 10:30am on a Wednesday and arrived at our hotel in Xi'an at 11:00pm on Thursday (yes, that's correct, the next day!). For me, the best way to recover from, and adjust to, such a time change, is to get into the sun and get some exercise. Luckily we arrived during the May Holiday and didn't have to start work the next day. So after a short night's sleep, breakfast and some time in the morning catching up on emails, we grabbed a taxi to the South Gate of the Xi'an City Wall.

Getting around town: Taxi is the easiest way to get around town. At the time of this writing (June 2005), the price for a taxi in Xi'an is 1.3 Yuan per Km. The fare is based on distance, not time. And most of our taxi fares ran about 10 Yuan. Most taxi drivers do not speak English, so communication can be difficult. The most common solution to overcoming this barrier, is to engage the concierge at our hotel and ask them to write down our desired destination(s), in Chinese. Our hotel had pre-made postcards with the name and address of the hotel in both English and Chinese. On the back of the postcard was a list of many of the popular tourist destinations, also in both English and Chinese. I carried one of these postcards with me everywhere. And I had no problem hailing a taxi and pointing to my destination as listed on the postcard. Most taxi drivers were very friendly and used to foreigners not speaking their language. A smile and, "Shie-shie," goes a long way.

Our first stop was the South Gate. Xi'an has one of the most complete ancient city walls in all of China. It surrounds the entire city center and is 13 Km in circumference, 30 to 40 ft high and 40 feet thick. On the outside of the city wall there is a deep, water-filled moat. We had several conversations regarding how imposing the wall must have looked to invading armies. Today it is a striking monument. On several different occasions, we spent time walking along the outside of the city wall. In many places you can walk along cobbled paths between the wall and the moat.  There are many nice vantage points for photography and the small parks sandwiched between the wall and moat are quaint and very local-oriented. You can see men of all ages practicing the Chinese martial arts, small groups of musicians, children in playgrounds and teenagers hanging out with their friends. This can provide a nice break from the tourist and museum circuit.

The air pollution in many Chinese cities has a very bad reputation, and it is well deserved in many cases. We experienced several beautiful, blue-sky days. But many days were hazy, smoggy and/or dusty. It was difficult to determine the source of the poor air quality. Locals told me that much of it is dust blown in from the northern loess plateau. Other sources suggest that industry and home heating (not this time of year) is to blame. Whatever the cause, it can make for unattractive skies and difficult photography. Just compare the first and third photos on this page!

Just inside the South Gate, and to the East, is a street filled with souvenir and craft shops. We browsed the shops, haggled a bit with the vendors and bought bags full of inexpensive, but not necessarily cheap souvenirs for our family, friends and co-workers back in the USA. At the time of this writing the exchange rate was about $US 1 = $Y 8.25.

Common Souvenirs: Terra Cotta Warrior replicas, jade and porcelain jewelry, silk fans, Chinese drawing and painting murals, pottery, paper crafts, etc. The quality of the merchandise is generally proportional to the price, although almost every price is negotiable. Vendors expect a certain amount of good-natured haggling.

The last evening we spent in Xi'an we climbed the city wall and spent several hours walking along the battlements with our new friends and co-workers. It was fun to look out over the city as the sun was setting and the lights of the city began to flicker on. Both the city wall and the city center Bell Tower and Drum Towers (on the next page) are interesting and beautiful night-time sights.

Ticket for the City Wall