We're back on the rails after our extended stay in Beijing: a whistlestop tour of some 'must-see' places.

We arrived in the small, walled town of Pingyao early in the morning, in the hazy grey before dawn. We took a lift through the backstreets in a 6 seater golf cart: inside the walls, all vehicles are either electric or pedal powered. We sensed far more than we could see: a relaxed atmosphere quite different from the vibrant chaos of Beijing.

Passing through an old stone gate, we all exhaled as one, looking down this old Chinese street, serenely lit with red lanterns on wither side. We gasped together again as the golf-cart-taxi pulled up outside one of these buildings - we had arrived at our lodgings for the next few days. It was in a traditional courtyard with large, well-apportioned rooms.

In the nineteenth century, Pingyao was one of the financial centres of China: the first bank in China was founded here in 1824 and many others followed. After the Boxer rebellion at the turn of the twentieth century, it was to Pingyao that the Dowager Empress Cixi turned, asking for loans to repay the extensive indemnities demanded by the Eight Allied Forces. As her reign collapsed, the loans defaulted and Pingyao lost its banks and authority. This sudden plunge into obscurity meant that Pingyao was left reasonably unchanged (although not unscathed) by the Cultural Revolution and, later, the massive population boom, making it a well preserved example of Qing dynasty architecture.

It is not a place to do things; cycling around the small town on a tandem - impossible to get lost in! - and walking along the town walls is as strenuous as it gets. Obviously the tandem was more strenuous for me, sitting at the front, until I realised Georgia wasn't pedalling. It is more of a place for walking and seeing. It is, I suppose, quaint, but in a 'chocolate box' kind of way; as Georgia put it, it's the Lacock of China. Interesting, pretty and colourful, it still never quite lived up to the promise of its early morning splendour.

Although for us Xi'an meant one thing - the Terracotta Army - it had become clear in Beijing that people had found other attractions. We met three people - separately - in Beijing who all raved about Xi'an. It may be relevant to note that they were all English. Their stories were uncannily similar: you've got to go to Xi'an - the nightclubs are amazing! '1+1' is the poshest nightclub in the world - international DJs, five floors of full club rooms, a roof garden - their voices becoming heady, breathless - and the MGM! It has a shop inside! We drank so much Bacardi. And the best thing - palpitatious now, as if about to explode - there's a 24 hour McDonalds just around the corner!

We arrived in Xi'an late, after all of the restaurants had closed. We set off to find some food, along the busy streets - if Pingyao is an attempt to preserve some of China's old atmosphere, Xi'an is a vibrant expression of its modernity. Gaudy, brash and neon, the wide streets and great fluorescent signs hit you immediately, a Chinese impression of Las Vegas. We walked around stunned until we happened upon a nightclub, called '1+1'.

'1+1' is amazing - it's the poshest nightclub in the world! We stopped in for a beer, getting lost in the variety of rooms, bars and spaces - including a fountain filled courtyard - until we found the roof garden. And the best thing? No, not McDonalds, but an extraordinary night market had appeared in the half hour we had been inside.

Miniature seats and tables were arranged round a variety of stir-fry, grill, and noodle stands. We went over to one, pointing at skewers of meat and vegetables that we wanted - this was only a sample: there were ten or more vegetables and various cuts of chicken, pork and beef available. Once we had chosen, the bread - a smaller, denser 'nan'-type bread - was quickly fried in the wok, before being replaced by our chicken, snow peas (like mange tout) and cauliflower. As they cooked, the bread was cut and liberally spread with a bright red paste, made from ground cayenne pepper (or something similar) and the cooking oil. It was delicious and extremely hot.

The next morning we went to see the Terracotta Army. Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of a unified China (in the third century BC), left quite some legacy from his brutal reign. As well as unifying China, he standardised weights and measures, enforced the use of a standard script throughout his empire, started building the Great Wall and, most curiously, built the terracotta army to protect him after his death. Taking about 37 years to complete, the army consists of over 7,000 individual soldiers, from archers and infantry to generals and cavalry, each with their unique faces, colouring (now faded) and uniforms. Their legs, however, are identical - they were made from a single cast. It has been suggested that the soldiers may represent individuals from Qin Shi Huang's real army.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the terracotta army is how recently it was found. Yang Zhifa, a peasant farmer who can apparently still be found signing postcards in the souvenir shop at times, happened upon them while digging a well in 1974. Since then, they have excavated a lot of the site, although in the largest chamber they have discovered about one thousand of the estimated several thousand soldiers, while there is even more work to be done in the secondary chambers, which goes on under full gaze of the tourists. Around the sites they have constructed huge aircraft hangers, paved walkways and a museum to make it a fully fledged tourist site.

You can get a fairly good look at many of the figures, although much of the largest vault is set far back from (and much lower than) the tourist viewing points. It's quite eerie at times, particularly in the second chamber where there are headless soldiers collapsed on the floor and spare limbs (and heads, staring blankly) lying around, like the aftermath of a Great War trench.

After all that horror, we decided we needed some country air, so we have made our way down to Sichuan province, where we will hopefully commune with some pandas, or at least get into the hills - pandas are somewhat shy, I understand. From here we're going to continue going south, trying to shake off the autumn rain clouds that are following us everywhere. We'll let you know, hopefully from sunnier climes, how we get on in our next article.

Links

There's an excellent interactive panorama of the terracotta army site available online at world-heritage-tour.org.