drydruid and ollie’s travels

Being stuck in Beijing (see Visa Woes) is not the worst thing that can happen to a couple of travelers.  There is enough to do and see to keep even the most hardy tourist occupied for months.  Our friend Leigh joined us for a week and we did our best to take in the sights.

The City is of course, the Forbidden City.  It is so large that if a baby were born there and to sleep in a different room every night, he would be 27 years old before he slept in every room.  As westerners we had a hard time grasping the splendor of the place.  The extravagent craftmanship is gorgeous and makes our 400 years in the US seem like current events rather than history.

No trip to China is complete without climbing the Great Wall.  Of course, the cool, misty weather disappeared that day and it was sunny and blisteringly hot.  We all got dehydrated and sunburned, but it was very exciting to walk on the actual wall.

 Once we were able to retrieve our now legal passports, we departed Beijing for Xi’an.  I saw a few of the terra cotta warriors in Chicago in 1978, but seeing them in the pit where they were buried was unbelievable.  There are thousands of them and each one is different from the next.  I wanted to buy a replica and ship him home to Richmond, but don’t think he would look quite right in our tiny courtyard.