Day 417 - Xi Xia Kingdom Pyramids

Early this morning we made our way by public bus (no 17) all the way to the terminal in order to get us as close as possible to the famous imperial tombs - from here it was only a 10 kuai taxi, compared to the 90 kuai or so from in the middle of town. The tombs date from over 1000 years ago during the Xi Xia Dynasty, and there are 9 imperial tombs and 200 others. When we first arrived we followed the crowds to Tomb no 3, so originally named, where we saw sacrificial platforms, watch towers, and other mud structures we're not sure what they are.What you literally see is a mound of dirt, but when you consider the age and harsh desert environment what you are gazing upon are the closest Chinese equivalent to the Egyptian Pyramids. Though we think these structures were initially built as pagodas, not as pyramids.

We then made the decision to make the 1 hour walk out to the Twin Tombs - where we had the entire area to ourselves, without ugly signposts and fences. Getting there was a bit of a challenge given that there were no directions to a path on how to get there. In the end we just decided to take the most direct route through the desert-like terrain and apart from a spider-scare and a lot of thorns we eventually stumbled out by the tombs. Here we got a better view of the Helan Mountain range which are supposed to be visible from the city, but we could hardly make them out here, some 30km closer!
We had lunch without anyone interrupting us, and then got a close up view of the tombs, including of the wooden bracings we saw in the museum. On the way back to the entrance we almost got caught in the rain - though finding the path made our return trip a bit easier!! Back at the carpark we tried to get a taxi, but the driver was asking twice what we paid to get there so we thought we'd try our luck on the street. Once the rain arrived, and after nearly being run over by trucks zooming past, we headed back with our tails between our legs for a ride. However we were invited into a taxi with a family, and although we paid for them, we got it for the price we paid in the first place.

Our timing was perfect, as on the way back it started pouring down, flooding the Chinese gutters and drains as it always does! Our bus dropped us 30 seconds away from a internet cafe, where we hid from the rain - on the way 2 full beer bottles came flying in our direction, 1 smashing within 20cm of us. We're not sure if they were aimed at us, but we bolted pretty quickly just in case there were more to come!

After grabbing our packs we jumped on a long bus ride to the train station and waited the hours away in a restaurant. Entering the train station was interesting - Adam was forced to drink from our (luckily not poisoned) drink bottle, and our juice smelled and checked for tampering! We guess we either look like terrorists or fears leading up to the Olympics are increasing.

Adlibing tombs.