The Pagoda Forest, near Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, China

The pagoda forest

After another exhausting walk, by now the heat was beginning to take its toll on everyone, we arrived at the pagoda forest.

A little history first:

The pagoda forest is located west of the Shaolin Temple and the foot of a hill.  As the largest pagoda forest in China, it covers approximately 20,000 square meters and has about 230 pagodas build from the Tang Dynasty (618-907) to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

Each pagoda is the tomb of an eminent monk from the Shaolin Temple.  Graceful and exquisite, they belong to different eras and constructed in different styles.  The first pagoda was thought to be built in 791.

It is now a world heritage site.

No, it's not a forest with trees it's a collection of over 200 pagodas, each a tribute to a head monk at the temple and it goes back a long time.  The tribute can have one, three, five, or a maximum of seven layers.  The ashes of the individual are buried under the base of the pagoda.

The size, height, and story of the pagoda indicate its accomplishments, prestige, merits, and virtues. Each pagoda was carved with the exact date of construction and brief inscriptions and has its own style with various shapes such as a polygonal, cylindrical, vase, conical and monolithic.



This is one of the more recently constructed pagodas

                                    

There are pagodas for eminent foreign monks also in the forest.

From there we get a ride back on the back of a large electric wagon



to the front entrance courtyard where drinks and ice creams can be bought, and a visit to the all-important happy place.



Then it's back to the hotel.

The Shaolin Temple, near Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, China

The Shaolin Temple

Where is the Shaolin Temple?



It is located in Dengfeng Ave, Dengfeng, Zhengzhou, Henan, China, at the southern foot of Mount Song, 13 km northwest of Dengfeng City, Zhengzhou City, Henan Province.

A map of the Temple grounds, which would come in handy before you enter the grounds, so that you have some idea of what there is to see:



A bit of history:

The Shaolin Temple was originally built in 495 during the Northern Wei Dynasty (368-534).  For over 1500 years, Shaolin Temple has developed through good and bad times.  The temple was firstly destroyed in the Northern Zhou Dynasty (557-581), then rebuilt much later as the Zhihu Temple.  In the Sui Dynasty (581-618) the temple was renamed Shaolin and became one of the largest Buddhism monasteries in North China.

Good fortune in the early Tang Dynasty (618-907) was followed by bad fortune in the later of Tang Dynasty, it improved during the Song Dynasty (960-1279) until 1312 in Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) where it returned to its former glory.  The Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) also made contributions to the development of Shaolin Temple.

Due to the wars of the modern era much of the Temple was destroyed.

The Shaolin Temple, nestled in the forested mountains of Henan, its the birthplace of Kung Fu and Zen Buddhism. The Shaolin Temple embraces many exciting attractions, such as the Hall of Heavenly Kings (Tianwangdian), and the Mahavira Hall (Daxiongbaodian)

This is not a single building, that's not how the Chinese work.  It’s a whole host of buildings, the first of which is up some steps, through a gate, then along a tree-lined avenue with monument stones to some more steps, past a cauldron burning incense, and then to the temple.  There are several monks inside.

The front entrance:



Inside the entrance building, there are some large statues that I'm guessing are there to scare away the wrong sort of people



Once past these characters, you are on a walkway between pagodas where there are trees, and sculptures

                          

and through the next pagoda brings you to the first of the temples.  There are three doors and three buddas.  This is through the middle door



And no you can't go inside, you just stand on the outside looking in.

                               

In one part of the temple there were three monks, and, believe it or not, they were all on their mobile phones.

This is certainly not ancient times, so what did the monks do before mobile communications?

Up some more stairs to the next building,



And so on till we reach the one at the top.  Outside each is a cauldron burning incense, and that aroma hangs on the air everywhere you go in the compound.



Then it's a case of what goes up must come down, and strangely enough, it doesn't take as long to go back down, and in doing so we got to see and hear a bit of singing by the monks.

There was a story to go with the various buildings and other aspects but I didn't hear half of it, and couldn't understand our guide for the rest.

All in all, it was an interesting place, but still not worth the money we paid.

Shaolin Kung Fu, near Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, China

After leaving the hotel in Zhengzhou, what was once one of the eight ancient capitals of China, we are going to Dengfeng city, and the home of China’s most famous martial art - Shaolin Kung Fu.

The Shaolin Temple nearby is the origin of Chinese Zen Buddhism, and the Songyang Academy, called “the Centre of Heaven and Earth” is located 87 Km from Zhengzhou, or, as we were advised, a 2 hour drive.  It will be scenic because we are heading towards the mountains.

As one of the four ancient Song Dynasty Academies, Songyang Academy is one of many schools in the province.  It is both on a large-scale, is quite spectacular, and is a comprehensive Wushu training base where students are trained to spread the Shaolin Wushu Kung fu style at home and abroad.

There is a 500 seat demonstration hall where you are able to observe 30 minutes of various martial arts in shows starting on the hour.

Outside there is a specific area that generally has about 600 trainees learning kung fu elements during the day, but can hold 5,000 [ep[;e when outdoor performances are required.

The kung fu school

The thing you notice most about the kung fu school is it's size and then the number of buses which tells you that it is a popular tourist stop.

And with that size comes long distances between the car park and the venues we need to go to, the first of which is about half a km, and that's just to get to the ticket plaza.



But, it is pleasantly set out and is quite a large number of shops for both souvenirs and food



We pass by some of the students going through their paces



From there it's another long, long walk to the show arena, where we're supposed to see various kung fu elements on display.  We watched this for a few minutes, then headed off towards the hall for a more intense demonstration of kung fu, and because there is limited seating we have to start lining at the head of the queue to get a seat.

But...

Everyone else has the same idea and we join the throng which then becomes a ride, and true to the Chinese they start finding ways to push in, even using the imaginary friend somewhere ahead in the queue.

The doors open and then it's open slather, with the hoards pushing from behind and sliding up the side to get in first.  We go with the tide, and manage to get in and find a seat though we were separated from three of our group.

It was an interesting show even though not one word of English was spoken, which from our point of view was a disappointment because we had no idea what was going on.



However...

It wasn’t hard to follow



What the performers were doing was relatively self-explanatory, and quite fascinating especially the guy who broke a sword over his head, and the guy who stopped two spears penetrating the neck, both examples of very disciplined men.



Boys gave a demonstration of kung fu moves, and intensity and age increased as this progressed to the end.

Next, we were taken in hand by an instructor in Tai chi or an equivalent, I was not quite sure what it was called, and went through the twelve or maybe more moves that constituted a morning or afternoon exercise session or it could be just for relaxation.  I lasted the first session but it was a little difficult to do with my sore limbs and a bad back.

Not that I could remember any of it now other than hands overhead, hands in front, bent knees, and a few gentle kung fu hand moves.

Perhaps when I get home I might seek out someone to show me the moves.

Whilst the others were following their training instructor, I wandered about, finding a large statue

                                        
 
And some smaller statues

Lunch in the Zen Restaurant

After all that exercise it was time to have the lunch purportedly the same food as the king fu masters.
It's in the Zen restaurant, aptly named, and the food when it came, came thick and fast, but some of it wasn't very nice, meat with bones, tofu, a tasteless soup, but some good dishes like the vegetables and noodles with meat, without bones.

The only problem, nothing to drink except a pot of hot water.  No tea, no cold water, and if you wanted a cold drink you had to pay for it.  After paying 550 yuan why should we have to pay more for a drink when we have not had to so far.

But no cold water?  That was just not on, and when we brought this to that attention of the tour guide she just simply ignored us.  We just didn't get anything.

That basically tainted the whole experience.

After lunch,  we had the Shaolin Temple, and the Pogoda Forest to visit.

The Glory Grand Hotel, Zhengzhou, China

The Glory Grand hotel

Like all the hotels we're staying in, it has an impressive foyer.  You walk in and you think on appearances it's going to be 5 stars, and not the 3 and a half rating on trip advisor.

Pity then that it all goes downhill from there.

We have a corner room and no bathroom.

Have you ever stayed in a hotel that has rooms with no bathroom?  Yes, it's a first for us too.  Still, this is China and I suspect if you complain there's always a worse room to put you in.

For us, it's just going to be an amusing situation we'd bear and give it a one-star rating on TripAdvisor for the hotel.

And just a word of warning, if you decide to book the hotel directly make sure you don't get a corner room.

At least everything else was reasonably ok.  Ok, not so much, the safe doesn't work.

This doesn't augur well for the rest of the tour in this particular place.

Before we leave, some photos of our room, and the lack of a bathroom.



Separate doors for shower and toilet, and on the other side of the passage, the washbasin



Feng Shui seems to have been forgotten when planning this room.

The next morning we discover that other rooms do have bathrooms but they're small.  Some have neither tissues or toilet paper, another has a faulty power socket and cannot recharge the phone, and I'm sure there are other problems.

All in all, it seemed very odd to have the toilet and shower on one side, and the wash basin on the other side of the passage.

From X'ian to Zhengzhou dong by bullet train, China

Lunch and then off on another high-speed train

We walked another umpteen miles from the exhibition to a Chinese restaurant that is going to serve us Chinese food again with a beer and a rather potent pomegranate wine that has a real kick.  It was definitely value for money at 60 yuan per person.

But perhaps the biggest thrill, if it could be called that, was discovering downstairs, the man who discovered the original pieces of a terracotta soldier when digging a well.  He was signing books bought in the souvenir store, but not those that had been bought elsewhere.

Some of is even got photographed with him.  Fifteen minutes of fame moment?  Maybe.

After lunch, it was off to the station for another high-speed train ride, this time for about two and a half hours, from X'ian to Zhangzhou dong.

It's the standard high-speed train ride and the usual seat switching because of weird allocation issues, so a little confusion reigns until the train departs at 5:59.

Once we were underway it didn’t take long before we hit the maximum speed



Twenty minutes before arrival, and knowing we only have three minutes to get off everyone is heading for the exit clogging up the passageway.  It wasn't panic but with the three-minute limit, perhaps organized panic would be a better description.

As it turned out, with all the cases near the door, the moment to door opened one of our group got off, and the other just started putting cases on the platform, and in doing so we were all off in 42 seconds with time to spare.

And this was despite the fact there were about twenty passengers just about up against the door trying to get in.  I don't think they expected to have cases flying off the train in their direction.

We find our way to the exit and our tour guide Dannie.  It was another long walk to the bus, somewhat shabbier from the previous day, no leg room, no pocket, no USB charging point like the day before.  Disappointing.

On the way from the station to the hotel, the tour guide usually gives us a short spiel on the next day's activities, but instead, I think we got her life history and a song, delivered in high pitched and rapid Chinglish that was hard to understand.

Not at this hour of the night to an almost exhausted busload of people who'd had enough from the train.  Oh, did I forgot the singing, no, it was an interesting rendition of 'you are my sunshine'.

The drive was interesting in that it mostly in the dark.  There was no street lighting and in comparison to X'ian which was very bright and cheerful, this was dark and gloomy.

Then close to the hotel our guide said that if we had any problems with the room, she would be in the lobby for half an hour.

That spoke volumes about the hotel they put us in.

Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum, X'ian, China

Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum

A little history, and anecdotal advice first:

In 1974 a 26-year-old farmer, Yang Jide, was drilling a well and found fragments of the terracotta soldiers and bronze weapons.

What was discovered later was one of the biggest attended burial pits of China’s first feudal Emperor, Qin Shi Huang.  In the following years remains had been found in 3 pits, yielding at least 8,000 soldiers and horses, and over 100 chariots.  The soldiers were infantry, cavalry, and others.

Emperor Qin was born in 259 BC and died in 210 BC.  He began building a mausoleum for himself at the foot of Mount Li when he was 13.  Construction took 38 years, from 247 BC to 208 BC.  It was divided into 3 stages and involved 720,000 conscripts.

The pits of pottery figures are 1.5 km east of Emperor Qin’s mausoleum.  Pit 1 has about 6,000 terracotta armored warriors and horses and 40 wooden chariots.  Pit 2 is estimated to have over 900 terracotta warriors and 350 terracotta horses with about 90 wooden chariots.  Pit 3 had so far yielded only 66 pottery figures and one chariot drawn by four horses.

Official records say it was discovered later that it was likely Xiang Yu, a rebel, intentionally damaged the Mausoleum and the soldiers in the pits, by setting fire to the wooden roof rafters, and these fell on and broke the warriors into pieces.

However, we were told that after the terracotta warriors were completed, the Emperor ordered the builders to be killed so that they would not tell anyone about the warriors, and then of those that remained alive deliberately smashed all of the artifacts.

The thing is, all of the terracotta figures that have been found are in pieces, and they need computers to piece them back together again.

The visit:

The first impression is the size of the car park and the number of buses parked in the lot, and a hell of a lot more outside up the road an off on side streets.  Obviously, it costs money to park in the parking lot.

The other first impressions; the numbers waiting to get in were not as many as yesterday outside the forbidden city, in fact, a lot less.

Be warned there's a long walk from the entrance gate where your bags are scanned and a body scan as well, before admittance.  This walk is through a landscaped area which it is expect might sometime in the future reveal more soldiers, or other artifacts.

At the end of the walk that takes about ten minutes, you can get a one-way ride to the second checkpoint, but we opted not to as no one else in our group did.

That walk is the warm-up exercise to an organized viewing of the exhibits after going through a second ticket checkpoint.  On the other side, we had to hand our tickets back to the tour guide which was disappointing not to end up with a memento of actually having been there.

So, on the other side in the courtyard, the guide told us the most important parts of the exhibition, that we should spend most of the time looking at pit 1, and then spent a little time in 2 which is only there in the first stages of excavation.  Then move onto the museum if only to see the replica chariots.

We do.

The chariots were small but interesting



The horses were better and intricately detailed



These are soldiers, perhaps complete examples of those types found in the end pit.



This is one of the archers.  You can tell by the way he wears his hair.

Pit 2

The excavation of this pit has only just begun, so it is possible to see where they have carefully removed the top cover, and you can see the broken parts of the warriors lying in a heap.



Some parts of the warriors are more discernible closer up



These parts are carefully extracted and taken to the ‘hospital’ where they are digitised and the computer will match each part with the warrior it belongs to.

Pit 1

This has quite a number of standing soldiers that have been glued back together, but not necessarily complete and I notice a number if the statues were incomplete. And if they cannot find the missing pieces, then they are not added to or filled in.



The scale of the pit is enormous, and they have hardly scratched the surface in the restoration process.

What is there is a number of horses as well.



That's at the front of the pit, a long line of statues, and what is clear is the location of the well where the first fragments were found by a farmer.

There are about eight lines of soldiers, and some lining the sides.

Midway down there is a large area currently under excavation



At the back is the hospital where the soldiers are reassembled.  There's nearly a hundred in the various stages of rebuilding.  These days the soldiers are rebuilt using computer imaging.



The hospital area is where they are put back together



And these are some of the statues in various stages of reconstruction



Another two views of the size and scale of the reconstruction project





The coffee shop is also a sales centre, but there are too many people waiting for coffee and too few places to sit down.