We were dropped off in the middle of Yinchuan at 4.30am this morning, and set off on foot to find somewhere to lay our weary heads, the conductor and drivers merrily waving us on our way. After a while our map had us confused so we stopped to ask a security guard for directions - the smile on his face was awesome when he realised we spoke Chinese, and he exclaimed "I can understand you!!!!". After an hour and a half we finally found a hotel with rooms available, but we had to wait an hour or so until someone checked out and it was clean. The guy at the hotel spoke excellent English and had even spent a couple of months travelling in NZ.
While waiting for our room we head off in search of some snack food, which is one of the perks of being in China - we were disappointed to hear from Franco and Marco that their city (hosting the Olympic Soccer matches) and any other Olympic cities have been stripped of their lively (and very Chinese) markets and street stalls.
We sat in the square where the South Gate looked upon us and the many other square goers who participated in various forms of tai chi, Chinese dance, and aerobics. We particularly enjoyed the 70+ year old solo groover, dancing to his heart's content away in the corner.
We ended up sleeping the rest of the morning away after getting almost none on the bus, and then ventured out to buy train tickets for tomorrow and lunch wandering past the drum tower on the way.
Later on we went to check out the Mosque, which was unfortunately under renovation, so we passed the day away in a bustling market and finally purchased Adam some new sunglasses!Adlibing it asleep.
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