We managed to drag ourselves out of bed and out for 9. We'd wanted to leave earlier than that but had both had such a terrible night's sleep that it just wasn't going to happen! Some ghoul in the pipes had been clanging all goddamn night long. We got out and didn't get to say goodbye to our roommate, who we'd barely spoken to, because he was gone. We never did find out what nationality he was - it kills me! Possibly Spanish.
We put our bulky bags into left luggage and got a taxi to the Longmen Caves on the outskirts of town. The taxi was overpriced but as we were both knackered with a pounding headache we just didn't care! The caves numbered into the thousands, but in terms of area they don't actually cover that much, and so owing to our speed tourism and extra power-walking because we were worried about missing our train, thinking thousands of caves would take hours, we actually finished really early. The caves are worth seeing; if you have a choice between the Longmen Caves and the Yunggang Grottoes, pick the Longmen Caves. The people that did the Yunggang Grottoes moved down to Longmen when their capital changed, and carried on with their cave-carving project. By the time they'd got to Longmen, their technique was much more refined and that is obvious. Incidentally, the reason it is called Longmen (Dragon Gate) is because there is a river overshadowed by mountains on either side (into which they carved the Buddhas). An emperor with a rather over-active imagination once said that the mountains looked like a formidable entryway, the sort of which a dragon would come bursting through.
As we had finished so early, we had time to get into another over-priced taxi and go to see the White Horse Temple, which is not actually in Luoyang, but in White Horse Temple Town (original name, that). The temple is the oldest temple in all of China but to our chagrin it had been destroyed and rebuilt completely in the Tang Dynasty. Still old, then, but not that old! It is still honoured as the earliest temple in China so I am glad I had the chance to see it. Having said that, it was difficult to feel any enthusiasm for it as we were so exhausted and had seen so many flippin temples! The same could be said for caves actually.
After the temple we scurried back to our taxi. The driver had agreed to wait for us for not much more money and we knew no other way to ensure that we'd get back in time for our train. We did of course make it. We had no seats but on the train one of the compartment doors opened in such a way as to create a little den that Liam and I appropriated for the entire journey. I wrote my diary whilst perched on my bag, and then ate instant noodles for dinner. Instant noodles and train travel go hand in hand in China. The noodles I ate were actually ones I'd bought in Shenyang in Liaoning Province, so they came a fair way!
Wuhan City is unusual in that it is made up of three cities: Wuchang, Hankou, and Hanyang, which are split up by rivers and connected by bridges. Our train pulled in at Hankou. We instantly bought night train tickets to Xi'an for the next day and then got a taxi to our planned YHI hostel in Wuchang. We had to cross the Yangtze to get there and the city seemed to have a really nice atmosphere.
The hostel's receptionists were a European girl who seemed Polish or Czech, and a British guy. It was strange after so much Chineseness! I think the idea was to have a really friendly hostel and they chatted with us a bit but for some reason it had a very awkward atmosphere. Too forced, perhaps. We got a dorm room but there was nobody else there. Because of the vicious and unexpected winter, the water pipes were completely frozen through, so we couldn't shower and used bottled water to clean our teeth. So to bed.
The river and cliffs that give Longmen its name.
The main attraction at the Longmen Caves, Fengxiansi. Plus me.
Little grottoes all over the cliff-face. Formerly they all had Buddhas carved into them, but now a lot have been destroyed or taken.
A really rather scary-looking horse at the White Horse Temple.
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