Firstly, to prove that you can get anything in China, here's an ad for the services available at a hotel in Xi'an. Note the bottom-right corner. If you're ever in Xi'an and need an enema, I know a good place.
Here is a photo of the lines to buy train tickets at the station in Xi'an.
Here are some photos of the Terra Cotta Warriors. Here I am posing as a Warrior and being a very stupid tourist.
Here are some photos of the Warriors themselves. Our guide said that there are as many as 750,000 statues buried, but that sounds like a bit of hyperbole. 
Each Warrior's face is unique. These soldiers are the infantry. 
After the Warriors we started our boat ride down the Yangtze river. Most of the ride was grey and misty, and here's a photo of one of the more scenic gorges we went through.
At the end of the boat trip, we got to go through the locks of the Three Gorges Dam, which is a pretty ridiculously large hydroelectric project. Three boats went through the locks at a time, passing so close to the concrete walls we could lean against them from the balcony in our room.
Here I am overlooking the dam itself.
One thing about Asia, but China in particular, is that everything is an opportunity to sell you ridiculous trinkets. This is the gauntlet you have to run to get to the "Ghost City" along the Yangtze. All 50 of these vendors yell at you that they are selling water or liquor or ridiculous souvenirs (all 50 stalls sell the same things).. you have to just ignore them. We long since gave up being polite.
We ended up back in Beijing, where we visited the Great Wall. We ended up with the only clear not to smoggy day. VERY hot!
Spent the next few days touring around Beijing. We visited the markets and wished for the first time since we have been on this trip that we could go directly home just so we could get some fun stuff. You can get ANYTHING you want at these markets and at very low prices. The sad part is that we can't carry it. So, alas we ended up with a few shirts to replace our very crappy, very worn shirts, a few knock off Coach bags ($6 USD each), and a silk table runner ($4USD). Could of gone crazy there. It was fun because we haven't been able to do any shopping because of our budget, sad to be restricted due to space! Oh well!
Went also to the Forbidden City. This was home to the Emperor for a lot of years (not sure how many). Construction began in 1406 though. There was so many people there that we really couldn't get any decent photos and frankly just got so annoyed with the pushing that we gave up and went home. The main issue with the tourism here is that it is summer break for a lot of the students so everyone is out tooling around. I would be interested to see if October is any different and easier to get around.
Spent our last day in Beijing at the Beijing.Zoo. The lonely planet called it death row for the animals. We were slightly surprised by this, considering that the travel guide puts such a great spin on everything they write about. We wanted to see the Pandas, so we went. It was SAD! The lonely planet wasn't that far off. The panda cages were very sad. There were just huge gaggles of people pounding on the glass and harassing the poor pandas for a better photo. They were confined behind the glass with no fresh air. We then decided to look around the zoo and quickly found out which were the most popular exhibits. The popular animals seemed to have worlds better environments. We walked by the white rhino. Which for those of you don't know is one of the rarest rhino's in the world. There are fewer than 50 Northern White Rhino's in the world today. There were 2 in the park. There was no trees for them.. no food and no vegetation in their pen. One of the rhino's was trying to eat a piece of grass that had grown between the cracks of the pavement. After, we wandered into the cafeteria and all of a sudden there was glass that the animals were on display while you were eating. The hippos and the rhino's never get a break from the tourists. Felt really bad for them. We ended up leaving there a bit depressed.
Traveled onto Hong Kong the next day and are finding it a bit easier to get around. The British influence is definitely present here. The British had a 100 year control over Hong Kong and in 1997 it was given back to China. To China's credit they have left Hong Kong to fend essentially for themselves and they are flourishing. They still maintain their democracy government and have their own currency. It is as if China and Britain merged to form a new nation, Hong Kong would be it. Here is the link if you want to read about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong
We traveled today to the outlook overlooking Hong Kong.
This is a picture of the top of tallest mountain in Hong Kong overlooking the bay. Notice all the high rises, they line the whole bay . Hong Kong is home to 6,864,346 people. You can see the need for the high rises.
Planning on heading tomorrow to Hong Kong Disney and then over to Cape Town, SA., the next day. Sorry the posts have been so few and far between. Hopefully, we will be able to get back on track. Hope this finds everyone well and enjoying your summer.
Gina& Bob
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