Day 7 - Chongqing & Xi'an

Early in the morning we disembarked from our "floating hotel" for the last few days and arrived in Chongqing.  The Chinese claim the population of this town, one I've never heard of, is between 30-34 million people.  If those numbers are correct, it would be the largest city in the world.  We just couldn't get over how big this city was and that we had NEVER heard of it before! The smog in Chongqing was so bad it was hard to even see across the river!

We caught a flight from Chongqing to Xi'an where our first stop was the Shaanxi History Museum.  There were quite a few neat things inside include real and model Terracotta Warriors.

 

While we were waiting for the group, this mom tapped me on the shoulder and motioned for me to take a picture.  I thought she wanted me to take her picture with her two young girls.  But it turned out the girls wanted to have their picture taken with me. They tried to speak a little English to me but were very shy.  Our picture didn't come up that cute, but it was a fun moment.

Our dinner that night was an adventure.  We went to a restaurant where no one spoke any English.  Fortunately between the pictures and a little detective work on figuring out some Chinese characters were able to order by point to the menu.  The food was great!  At the end of the meal the men decided they wanted to try what the Chinese referred to as Fire Water.  It is a clear liquor distilled from Sorghum.  It came in this cute snowman clay bottle. :)

 

It was a great night with people who became great friends on the trip; Dave, Mary Jane, Curt and Mary.