Pingyao

The overnight train from Xian to Pingyao was an experience. We booked the most expensive seats called soft sleeper. That meant we had a narrow hard bed in a room of 2 double bunks. Hard sleeper would have been an even harder bed in a room of 2 triple bunks. So we arrived at 7 am a tad tired and headed to our traditional courtyard hotel, where we were shown to our room even at that early hour. The owner proudly showed us the kang (traditional Chinese bed) and said how soft it was. Hah! Thank heavens I brought a thermarest with me. The courtyard however is delightful, decorated with red lanterns and very atmospheric at night. The film 'Raise the Red Lantern' was filmed in the Pingyao region, as no doubt were many other period Chinese films.

Pingyao has the best preserved city walls in the country. The buildings within the walls all date from the Qing or Ming dynasties. This town is where finance and banking started in the 1300's. Now there are many buildings from that era that are small museums, explaining the banking background. The rest of the old city is all tourism - hotels, restaurants, souvenir shops. You can have a 45 minute foot massage for $5, and rent a bike for a $ 1.50 per day.

Some of the signage here has hilarious English translations. Ming the Step seems quite appropriate since there are buildings from the Ming dynasty here. One sign talked about men being superior and women being 'interior'. Or maybe the translator had a Freudian slip.

Tomorrow we head to Beijing by ultra high speed train - 300 kph.

- Kitty