Today is a travel day to Xi’an.  Our flight out of Beijing was schedule for 8:25, which meant we had to be on the bus at 6 am.  As the restaurant wasn’t open, then provided us with a brown bag breakfast (white bread, boiled eggs and a banana).  When we arrived at the airport, we found that due to the thunderstorm that rolled through last nightearly this morning, our flight was delayed.  The plane had actually not yet left Xi’an…  We waited at the airport for about 45 minutes and then Jack rounded us up and said they were taking us to a hotel to wait…  Apparently the government has rules that limit the amount of time they want people waiting around?

We were driven to a local hotel where they gave us breakfast (actually nothing left) and then assigned us rooms.  This was not the nice level of hotel we’d been staying at – rooms were clean, but smelled heavily of smoke and the AC was not working.  Anyway we waited there about two hours and then headed back to the airport.

Our flight finally arrived in Xi’an at around 5 o’clock.  This is a city of around 8 million people and is best known for it’s heavy industry and defense industry.  Also for growing cotton, winter wheat and corn.  We were supposed to have had lunch and visited a couple of places in the afternoon, but due to the delay our local tour guide, Yao, said we would have to head directly to the Tang Dynasty dumpling dinner & show that was scheduled.  As this was an optional excursion those not attending would then be taken to the hotel.

Dinner was supposedly around 16 rounds of various types of dumplings; pork, chicken, duck, veggie, mushroom, shrimp, etc.  Many were actually shaped like what the filling was – the duck and fish were the most identifiable.  After the show it was back to the hotel by about 9:30.

Duck Dumpling at the Tang Dynasty dinner theater.