Xi'an city

Day One

The tour began with taking a red-eye flight scheduled to depart at 0300 hours. Took a cab at mid-night to Changi Airport Terminal 3. After immigration clearance, I decided to take late supper at "Kaffe & Toast" in the transit area (left photo below). Ordered a Toast Bread set with Half-boiled eggs and Teh-C at SGD 4 (right photo below), which I hoped could satisfy my hunger.
Flight to Xi'an

Boarded MU 5094 flight which was almost in full occupancy (left photo below). Early breakfast was served about an hour later after the flight took off (right photo below). Disappointedly the noodle was rather salty and cold.
The flight stopped at Kunming airport and all passengers had to walk down from the plane to the terminal building (left photo below). I was quite lost within the terminal and "wandered" for about 10 minutes before reaching to the other boarding gate. After transferred by the airside bus, we finally got onto the flight using the boarding steps (right photo below).
Flight to Xi'an was also in full occupancy (left photo below). Delighted that some light snacks were served in this short flight of 2.5 hours (right photo below). Due to some reasons that passengers were unaware, this flight was delayed and landed in Xi'an Xianyang Airport at about 11 am instead of 0940 hours.
Xi'an City

Xi'an is the capital of Shaanxi Province (陕西省) and third most populous city in Western China. Known as Chang'an (长安) in much of its history, Xi'an is one of the Chinese Four Great Ancient Capitals, having held the position under several of the most important dynasties in Chinese history, including Western Zhou, Western Han, Sui, Northern Zhou and Tang.

Lunch

After brief introduction by our Xi'an tour guide at the airport, we then proceeded to a Chinese restaurant "汉唐天下 ▪ 私房菜" (photos below) for lunch.
A total of six dishes, together with fried rice, vermicelli soup and some fruits were served (photos below).


Next, we were transferred to Orient Hotel Xi'an which would be our hotel for the first night.

Instead of ancient Xi'an city tour, we opted for a "Terracotta Army" tour at additional RMB 300 per person as our afternoon attraction visit. This would include transport and a guided tour into the Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum.

Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum (秦始皇帝陵博物院)

Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum was built based on the Mausoleum of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, which was historically known as Mount Li and is the largest imperial tomb in China with the richest buried objects. This museum is located 37-km east of Xi'an city centre in Lintong District (临潼区) of prefecture-level city of Xi'an. It takes about an hour's drive to the museum from the city centre.

Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an, known as the eighth wonder of the world, is declared as World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987.

With an area of 226-hectares, this site park of Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum was opened to the public on 01 Oct 2010. It contains the tumulus of Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum, major architectural sites that have been discovered, ritual sacrifice pits, the Museum of Terracotta Acrobatics, Museum of Terracotta Civil Officials, Museum of Stone Armor and Museum of Bronze Chariot and Horse. Even the admission ticket has a brief description of the museum (photo below).

Admission tickets were first bought from the ticket counter by our tour guide (left photo below). After gotten our tickets, we had to enter the museum from this main entrance (right photo below).
Terracotta Warriors Pit 1

Terracotta Warriors Pit 1 is the largest pit of the underground Terracotta Army. A large hall with an area of 16,000 square meters was built over the pit in 1976 and opened to public in 1979 (left photo below). The pit is an east-west rectangular pit, measuring 210-meters long, 62-meters wide and 4.5 to 6.5-meters deep (right photo below).
Inside it, there are over 6,000 terracotta warriors and horses including infantry, cavalry and chariot warriors. They are life-like and life-sized, and arranged in a battle formation. Some warriors wore robes (left photo below) while some wore armors (right photo below), and all of this were according to their rank or army services.
A three-line vanguard of 204 infantrymen stands in the front facing east (left photo below). Immediately behind them are 36 rows of armed soldiers with war chariots at various intervals. A single column of soldiers faces North and South flanking the main body of men (right photo below), while a further column face west as the rear.


During our visit, Pit 1 is still undergoing its further excavation (photos below).

Terracotta Warriors Pit 3

Although this is the smallest of the three main pits, with an area of 520-square meters (left photo below), it was the command centre for both Terracotta Warriors Pit 1 and Pit 2. Archaeologists speculate that at some point vandals broke into this pit and deliberately destroyed the warriors (right photo below).
Built in the shape of the Chinese character "凹", the Terracotta Army Pit 3 measures 17.6-meters long from east to west, 21.4-meters wide from north to south and 4.8-meters deep. It can be divided into three parts: chariot and horse chamber (left photo below), northern wing room (right photo below), and southern wing room.

Terracotta Warriors Pit 2

Covering an area of about 6,000 square meters, the Pit 2 is L-shaped, approximately measuring 96-meters from east to west, 84-meters from north to south, and 5-meters deep. Although not as grand as Pit 1, the Terracotta Warriors Pit 2 is the most complete pit as it houses all types of terracotta warriors found so far, including infantries, cavalries, chariot warriors and archers (photos below).
Currently only one sixth of the pit has been fully excavated while the rest are partially unearthed to reveal the remains of wooden shelters (photos below).
Next to the pit, there is a large exhibition hall with many cultural relics unearthed from terracotta warriors Pit 2 on display. Visitors can closely witness a certain number of representative pottery figures and Qin weapons there, such as the Kneeling Archer (left photo below), Middle-ranking Officer (right photo below), High-ranking Officer (bottom left photo) and Cavalryman with saddled War-horse (bottom right photo).

Heritage Exhibition Hall of Mausoleum

Located next to the Terracotta Warriors Pit 2, this exhibition hall should not be missed (photos below).
Two large scale models of bronze chariots and horses came unearthed in December, 1980, about 20-meters west to the mound of Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum. Intended to serve as the vehicles for the inspection tours of Emperor Qin Shi Huang in his afterlife, these two chariots and horses are half size scale models of the real ones of Qin Dynasty (221 – 207 B.C.). Faithfully copied down to the last detail, each chariot is complete with a team of four strong horses and a coachman.

No. 1 Chariot is the vanguard. There is a large umbrella providing shade from the sun. Its handle is flexible and rotatable to block the sun from different angles, hence this umbrella is considered to be the world's earliest sunshade. A driver is standing below the umbrella, with his hands holding the horses' rein (photos below).


No. 2 Chariot is larger than No. 1 chariot, also its chariot is enclosed. The horses are richly adorned with gold and silver trappings. The chariot has three windows, one to the front, and one on either side in the compartment, and a door opens at the back. The roof is umbrella shaped, said to be symbolic of the round sky. There is a kneeling figure driving the No. 2 bronze vehicle (photos below).
Besides the bronze chariots, there is a display on the Museum's History (photos below).
There are descriptions on the archaeological processes (photos below).
Past visits from important foreign dignitaries were displayed, including family of U.S. President Bill Clinton visited on 26 Jun 1998 (left photo below) and Prime Minister of Singapore visited on 17 Sep 1985 (right photo below).

Museum Souvenir Shop

Probably part of the building design, all visitors will have to walk pass the souvenir shop (photos below).
The Terracotta Army was discovered on 29 March 1974 by a group of farmers: Yang Zhifa, his five brothers together with their neighbour, who were digging a well approximately 1.5 kilometres east of the Qin Emperor's tomb mound at Mount Li. One of the discoverers now worked in this souvenir shop to sign books sold to visitors (photos below).

Cherry Blossom at Museum Park

Perhaps it was cherry blossoms session during our visit, we were fortunate to see this massive flower bloom in the museum park (photos below).

Sculptures related to Emperor Qin Shi Huang

Emperor Qin Shi Huang was the first emperor of China. It was the first time in Chinese history that all separate states were unified under one powerful ruler. Under this unified China, various measurements such as weights and measures, and currency were standardized. Chinese civilization was brought to a greater heights in this unified country.

Perhaps part of Chinese civilization revival, several sculptures related to Emperor Qin Shi Huang can be found near the museum, including the bas-relief of "兼并天下" (left photo below) and the sculpture of the emperor himself (right photo below).


The brief "Terracotta Army" tour ended and we were then transferred back to the hotel.

Dinner at local restaurant

Dinner was not included in the tour package for the first day, thus we had to search for our meal. Decided to have dinner at a local restaurant "李铁灌汤包" just opposite our hotel across the road (left photo below). We were quite overwhelmed by the varieties on its menu (right photo below).
Ordered a fried mung bean jelly (炒凉粉), wide noodles casserole (粉带砂锅), vegetarian pocket pie (菜盒) and seafood soup dumplings (三鲜灌汤包) in this restaurant (photos below, left to right and top to bottom). Total cost for this meal was RMB 55. The fried mung bean jelly was rather spicy and caused mouth numbness. However the rest of food was satisfactory.


After dinner, we went back to hotel for an early rest as we did not sleep well on the flight.