Today we had to wake up early again so we could get to our first destination early, the Terra-Cotta Warriors. We had to go early so we could try to beat the crowds a little bit, otherwise it would have been hard to get a good view of the warriors in the pit. There were a few excavation sites and pits that you could visit, some had well-preserved statues in showcases, so we made our way through the various pits until we reached the final and most famous one that you see all the pictures of.
I learned today that Chinese grandmas are very aggressive and don’t care about personal space. When trying to maneuver through the most famous pit I got elbowed in the ribs at least 5 times. It was very claustrophobic, but I managed to miraculously find a spot near the front to see the warriors. Once I got a few pics I yeeted myself out of there and back outside.
Once we all made it out and got our group picture we got some lunch and then headed back into city center Xi’an to the city wall. Xi’an is near a desert and at this point in the day a sand storm had started to blow towards the city. We had to buy some face masks and once we got them on we picked up some bikes and rode bikes around the wall.
The city wall, as the name would suggest, used to surround the whole city until it rapidly expanded. So it was like 9 something miles around the whole wall, and about a two hour journey. The combination of riding on a bumpy brick pathway, the masks, the sand in our eyes, the wind, and the bikes disproportionately sized to tall me, a few of us decided to take a break at a convenience store and eat ice cream and then turn around instead of making the whole circular journey. Once the tiring journey was done we all headed back to the hotel and got some of the famous lamb soup, which was well worth the hype, for dinner. Then myself and a few friends went exploring the city for our last night, and we ended up going to the same ice cream shop as the last two nights, because I liked it that much. And what made my night, was that the man at the ice cream counter recognized me from how often I visited. Man, I’m gonna miss him. Thus was the end of our last night in Xi’an.
