Xian - Guandzhou

The  blog on the Terra Cotta Warriors should be read before this blog. 

We have come to our journey's end! We commenced our journey at the beginning of the Silk Road at Guandzhou and ended it here at the termination of the Silk Road at Xian. Xian was once the political capital of China in the Qin dynasty and the cradle of Chinese civilisation.  

This evening we fly back to Guandzhou and spend our last evening with J. A return train journey was tentatively mooted via Shanghai - anything between 28 and 35 hours - but that idea was firmly dismissed in favour of flying . There's only so much 'train' a girl can take!! 

We will stay at the airport hotel as the airport is 28 km north of the city and our flight leaves tomorrow at midnight. 

This morning, as a heavy smog again envelops the city, as a view from our bedroom window illustrates,       

we have decided to have a 'hotel' day - unusual for us. We will not cycle around the town walls - the smog level had decided that... We will  remain in the hotel until our taxi collects us to take us to the airport. 

As I write. I again hear the tune of It's a Small World. I first heard it as we walked to the Muslim Quarter on our first afternoon here. We weren't in Disneyland - no the music emanated from a truck spraying the roads!! The public areas are kept scruplessly clean as elsewhere in China. Spitting is less prevalent now than when I was last here in 2000! If only the smog might be addressed in Xian - I can't see their tourism industry developing until this issue is addressed - 

tourists will stay a day or two to visit the  Army of Terra Cotta Warriors and Horses and depart.... 

THE END