Last Train to Pingyao

We were both sad to leave Beijing as there was plenty of things there that we still wanted to do but onwards and upwards to our next adventure on an overnight train to Pingyao. We arrived in plenty of time to get on our train and managed to get onto our carriage but you would have thought that the train was about to leave with the amount of pushing and shoving going on. There were 18 carriages and out one had rows upon rows of 6 bedded cubicles with no dividers - just like a big dorm on wheels and then there were two small chairs with an even smaller table facing each cubicle. We sat on the seats for a while waiting for the train to go.

So the train took off on time about 7.30 pm and shortly after we both got settled into our middle bunks (we were even provided with a pillow and a thin duvet) and managed to read for a while until the lights were suddenly switched off around 10pm. So I was wide awake and left lying listening to all the noises around me whilst Chris was listening to the MP3. Well we had all sorts in our compartment there was a snorer, a sniffer, a stripper and a snoozer: The snorer believe it or not was neither Chris nor I but the guy on the top bunk, I was the sniffer (I had a bit of a cold), the stripper was a guy who came on later in the night and took of his trousers on our bunks - I had to turn away (Chris told me later that he had legging things on) and lastly that leaves Chris as the snoozer since both he and I only had naps throughout the night.


We got off in complete darkness at 5.30am and managed to eventually get a motorcycle cab to take us to our Hostel. So we drove in complete darkness into the ancient walled city (we could have been taken anywhere), Chris even spotted a street cleaner sweeping the streets with no light!! So we were deposited off at our hostel and woke two girls sleeping in bed which turned out later to be a table in reception and we were taken in through an unlit courtyard to our room which involved a few tricky steps. The bed was huge and both of us just fell into it without really taking much notice of our surroundings.

When we woke up we could smell the drains from the bathroom….not very pleasant. The room was ok but seemed to be a bit cold/damp and the bed well it turned out we were lying on top of bricks - apparently this was all the rage hundreds of years ago for beds in China. We then headed out past reception where we found 4 girls sleeping at a table. We didn’t want to disturb them so we quietly slipped past them onto the street. We wandered along several streets/lanes full of tourist shops selling your typical Chairman Mao things along with Chinese paintings and paper cut outs. Pingyao’s claim to fame is that this is where the first cheque was ever written and it used to be the financial headquarters for China during the Qing dynasty. Most of the buildings within the city’s walls are original from the early 1800’s and the wall surrounding the town is still intact. The place was thriving merchant city but when the Qing dynasty collapsed in 1911 the city fell into poverty and there’s was no money available for modernising the buildings and streets. The city was named a world heritage site as it is a excellent preserved example of a traditional Han Chinese City. Several films have been shot here using the town as it’s backdrop. We went through an archway out onto a busy main street and walked for a bit with the locals staring at us again. We had lunch by grabbing a few small spring onion and garlic dumplings off of a stall which were so tasty we went back several times over the next few days.

We walked back through the town which wasn’t that big replying “Hello” to the kids several of them also even said how it was nice to meet us in very formal accents (obviously stage 2 of the English book). Plenty of restaurants seemed to have ‘English menus’ and ‘Western Food’ but we hadn’t had enough of the Chinese food yet, so we went into a small place which was busy downstairs and managed to get a seat on a small balcony for dinner. We ordered pork fried dumplings, a pork dish and a potato dish (both of which were local recipes). The dumplings came and were excellent - we were off to a good start. Then the main courses came with the pork being delicious but the potatoes turned out to be similar in taste to the small frozen potato fritters you can buy back home. The city had closed fairly quickly and by 9pm there was very little left open so we wandered slowly back to the hostel. The room was freezing but fortunately we did have air conditioning which doubled up as a heater.


The following morning we went onto the internet first and then decided to walk the 6Km Ming Dynasty wall around Pingyao. You paid for a ticket which seemed to get you into lots of places although there was no full list in English to be found which told you where you could go. As we walked around locals (adults and kids) would smile and wave up to us from the houses and streets below the wall. The buildings were all dark grey/black in colour and probably looked like Glasgow might have in the 1900’s due to the soot from coal fires and pollution from the surrounding factories. The houses are not allowed to be altered and have to remain the same but we aren’t sure if the locals are that happy with that. We saw cows, sheep, pigs and goats being kept in back gardens, corn on the cob and chillies drying on the top of roofs and a prison with several inmates waving at us (or maybe it was some backpackers in a really cheap hostel).


After this we headed for a well earned beer and whilst doing this found out why the locals were staring at us so much. Since I had a skirt on and Chris had shorts on we both had bare legs which the locals couldn’t understand as to them it was cold. A wee old lady pointed to my legs and gave a brrr sound whilst another woman walked by commenting on them (later on Chris had the same type of reaction from an old man). So after a beer and a chicken burgers (our first western food since our MacDonald’s in Japan) we headed back towards the hostel. The sun was starting to set and we climbed the Fengshui tower just outside our hostel and we quickly whizzed round the financial museum which also explained punishments before they closed the door on us at 6pm sharp.


A few words about the hostel apart from having a smelly room, being the only guests, no lights in the courtyard at night and the hardest bed in Asia we were also very disappointed by the staff. Anytime we asked for assistance or advice, even buying a bottle of water felt as if we were disturbing them from their sleep or food. We were never made welcome at any point in time and since found out it wasn’t just us they didn’t like as we’ve met another couple who were treated exactly the same. They also advertised their services for booking train tickets and tours but any enquiry was met with a curt ’No’ and no guidance on how to get them. So you won’t be surprised to see no link to the Yamen International Youth Hostel and if you are ever in this area don’t come here but read the next paragraph.

We had dinner that night in the Tianyuankui Hostel and had noodle soup and dumplings which were both delicious and we also managed to book our train from here with extremely helpful staff. This place was also a guesthouse and we really wished we were staying here as there were plenty of people around the place unlike ours.

On the Monday we decided to walk to the Shaunglin Temple which was 6km from the city. We weren’t bothered too much by the cyclo drivers trying to give us a lift and it took us just over an hour to get there. There was lots of restoration work being carried out around the buildings and pathways but internally a lot of the statues and buddhas needed some major work on them and some loving care to bring them back to their original splendour. We were a little disappointed in the temple as many of the statues were behind huge iron cages and you couldn’t see them fully but we would like to go back and see this place once it has been fully restored.


We had time to kill on the Tuesday but tried to tick off as many of the other museums and temples from the invisible list on our ticket. We went to the Rishenchang Financial House Museum which gave a little explanation of the rooms and the titles and job description of the people employed there. After a lunch we went into a Taoist temple and then the Confucius Temple which also held an International Photography Exhibition which had some great photos from around the world.


We also went into a Martial Arts place but the demonstration was 3 hours away and all we saw were numerous ancient looking implements for fighting (I tried out some of my Shaolin Buddha finger moves out on Chris who was soon writhing in agony on the floor). I saw what I thought was a religious festival but it turned out to be a Buddhist’s funeral procession. There were cars at the front, huge circular flower displays, a band, several men in chef’s hat holding food on plates and mourners following behind in the strange little golf carts you see all around town. We had a quick dinner and collected our tickets before having the second of our motorcycle cart rides through the city to the train station and our second overnight train journey.