Nati on the road: July 2018

I often get inspired to visit new places to visit simply after having seen a photo of this place. I see it on the photo and I absolutely want to see it with my own eyes it one day. That was the case of the Leshan Giant Buddha whom I so much liked on the photo, that I wanted to see it for real.

This UNESCO World Heritage Site is the largest and tallest stone Buddha in the world. It is 71 meters high and has 8,3 meter long fingers! The construction of the Buddha was initiated by a Chinese monk names Hai Tong. He hoped that the Buddha would calm the turbulent waters, which were making many boats and ships crash. Begun in the year 713 in the Tang Dynasty and finished in the year 803, the statue took people more than 90 years to carve.

And indeed while planning the trip in China I took it into consideration while planning the itinerary. Leshan is easily reachable from Chengdu - the train takes around 1h to get there. Although we left in the morning, when we arrived to the Buddha in the late morning, the place was very crowded. After a climb up the back of the rock, we reached a place from which we could admire Buddha from above - we were next to his head. However if we wanted to see Buddha from the level of his feet, we had to join a huge number of people queuing to go down to the ground level. Well, it was the only way to see it (other than doing it by boat), so we didn't have a choice. We waited like 2h, but finally started to descent. It wasn't the most pleasant and comfortable way to visit with hundreds of people around, but when we finally reached the bottom it was really a great view!

Although the waiting time and the descent were a bit discouraging, the fact that we could admire Buddha in all its splendor easily paid back all this effort. It was simply spectacular!

While surrounding the rock on the way back, we noticed another attraction called Oriental Buddha Capital. Although the entrance was not very cheap, I thought that since I'd most probably never come back here, I'll check out this place. This site was a very large park with hundreds if not thousands statues of Buddha carved in the rocks. This place was very new (created in 90s), but I really liked it. Buddhas were of different sizes - like for instance a giant face of Buddha carved out of a mountain (33 meters high).

Next city on our agenda was legendary Xi'an and its biggest attraction - the Terracotta Army. We got there by as bullet train from Shanghai. It was a long and tiring trip, so we were very happy when we finally made it to our hotel - very late at night.

Xi'an is one of the oldest - 3000 years of history - cities in China and one of the Four Great Capitals. It was also starting point of the Silk Road. It is famous not only for Terracotta Army, but also of its ancient city walls. Our hotel was located within the walls - on the map it all look small, but in reality the distances were really big. When we finally left the hotel the next (late) morning, it took us quite some time to walk to the main attractions.

The day was hot, very hot. I had impression it was even warmer than in Shanghai. We had to make short breaks in the shadow, so the walk took us some time. We did not have a big plan for that day. We were tired, it was hot. We wanted just to walk around.

We made it to the Bell Tower and then the Drum Tower. Both these sites are Xi'an's landmarks. Also, both towers come from the fourteenth century. They were mainly used for time reporting and publishing news in ancient times. Despite the heat, we could see that both these places were quite crowded. We then continued our walk toward the Muslim quarter.

The fact of being on the Silk Road had a great influence on increasing the Muslim population of the city. The biggest attraction of this area was the Great Mosque - one of the oldest, largest and best-preserved Islamic mosques in China. Its construction started in 742 AD, however majority of the mosque was built during early Ming dynasty (14th century) and some additional were built in later years. The mosque is a great example of mixed architecture, as it combines a traditional Chinese architecture and Islamic art. In Chinese style, there are a series of pavilions, with the four courtyards of the mosque between them. The wall, however, is decorated with Islamic art and the mosque is directed west towards Mecca. This place was quite peaceful, with a lot of shadow. Quite a green and calm oasis :)

We then headed to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda, which was located outside the city walls, so we took a didi to get there. It's one of the best examples of Tang-style (square) pagoda from the seventh century. We visited this place with a lovely lady who said she can guide us for free, because she wanted to practice English. She was though so nice and really knowledgeable, that we of course paid her.

In this complex, we found also an art gallery. I immediately felt in love with one painting and after hard negotiations, I became its lucky owner :)

Everybody was fascinated with Nina and wanted to take a photo of her :)

In the evening we went to see the famous city walls or actually the fortifications of Xi'an. These are actually the best preserved ancient city walls in the whole of China! The fortifications were built int he 14ht century, and since then were refurbished a few times. Initially built as a military defensive systems (which was one of the largest in the ancient world), currently it's Xi'an's biggest touristic attraction. The walls have 98 ramparts and four main gates. I was stunned how huge these walls are and how huge area they enclose (about 14sq km!). Great way to explore them was by bike, but since we were with a pram, we could just envy the cyclists.

While walking on the Xi'an City Walls I saw several "just married" couples, making their professional photo sessions there. What attracted my attention was the fact that all brides wore red dresses. Later I found out that in Chinese culture red is a traditional and sacred colour, which is supposed to bring luck, happiness, success, love, vigor etc. It is also a symbol of good fortune that drives evil spirits away. This is why most Chinese brides were red on their big day :)

We ended up our day with a great Chinese dinner :)

On the second day we decided to go to see the Terracotta Army. Located one hour from Xi'an, we did not want to loose time and go there with the public transport. We already knew that sometimes distances seemed to be small and in the end they were quite enormous. Traditionally we took didi, who drove us there in around one hour. Although we had an ambitious plan to get there early in the morning in order to avoid crowds, unfortunately we did not manage... When we arrived around 11AM, the place was of course totally full.

The Terracotta Warriors Museum is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the biggest attractions of China. The Terracotta Army comes from the 3rd century BCE and it is a collection of sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China. The warriors were supposed to protect the emperor in his afterlife. They were discovered in 1974 by local farmers who were digging a water well. With time more and more sculptors were found and the currently it is being estimated that the army counts more than 8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots with 520 horses, and 150 cavalry horses. The majority of the sculptures are still under the ground and have to be excavated.

The entrance to the museum was not cheap - around 20 euros, but I have to admit that this place was absolutely unique and spectacular - it's absolutely worth this money. The museum is composed of three pits - the first one being the biggest and the most impressive. I was totally amazed by this place. It was unbelievable that over 2000 years ago, without modern tools, such an astonishing army of life-sized warriors was created. What is even more incredible is that there are no two identical sculptors!

I could also feel like an empress in these beautiful clothes... ;-)

Upon our return to Xi'an we had the best meal during our stay in China - in the Haidilao Hot Pot Cheng. Basically it was a simple hot pot place, but the experience was a great fun!