Whilst Ebeneezer Ivanov has been bah-humbugging in Beijing, Matt and I have had a cracking time in Xi’an, home to China’s infamous army – the Terracotta Warriors. We shot down on Monday morning and spent three snowy nights in a cosy hostel in a traditional Chinese townhouse. Even though we are well and truly out of the tourist season and despite the freezing temperatures the hostel was busy with the familiar atmosphere of travellers coming and going. It was great to return the lifestyle we’ve grown to love over the last year.

We’d been warned by a few friends that Xi’an is a shitpit who recommended no more than flying in, visiting the warriors sharpish and flying straight out. How misguided they are – Xi’an’s a cracking little town to kill some time. The city is an old provincial capital surrounded on four sides by huge city walls and it’s home to a number of ancient attractions such as the obligatory bell and drum towers, a buzzing muslim quarter which only wakes up in the early evening and China’s largest mosque. The tranquil grounds and pretty snow covered pagodas make this mosque unlike any other you’ve ever seen. We spent many hours tottering around the narrow streets and eating plenty of delicious street food, however we weren’t here for the food…. booo.

We took a ride to Panda sanctuary two hours outside the city, home to 18 of the loveable bumbling bears. The previous night covered the enclosures with five inches of snow, but this didn’t stop the pandas from rolling around, having a good scratch and eating. What a cracking life. The highlight of the centre was two cheeky year-old pandas who were having a riot in their enclosure, bounding around in the snow, standing on their squat hind legs and providing much amusement by getting their big bear bums stuck in trees before falling to the ground with a thump. No wonder they’re endangered.

Of course, we’d come to Xi’an to visit one of China’s most popular tourist attractions – the Terracotta Army, which did not disappoint. We stood at the end of the main compound and looked across to see over 2,000 life size warriors with horses and chariots staring back at us, a most incredible sight. I learnt a couple of interesting facts – firstly they did not just excavate the site and find thousands of warriors standing there in formation. Oh no, 2000 years had taken it’s toll on the warriors for they were discovered in broken heap of millions of pieces. So far since they were discovered in 1974 they’ve managed to reconstruct 2000 warriors out of the estimated 8000 on the site. My second factoid is that emperor Qin (who commissioned the incredible army) was just 13 when he ordered their construction – it sounds to me like someone never got over playing with toy soldiers. The surreal highlight of the day came when our guide asked if we’d like to meet the farmer who found the warriors. I had visions of a mechanised wax model in a poorly assembled reconstruction of the discovery, but how naive of me. Mr Yang, one of the farmers who found the army is now employed to sit behind a desk whilst tourists shuffle past and gorp. How very Chinese.

We rounded off our stay in Xi’an with a drunken night in a terracotta army themed bar, drinking until the early hours with an interesting mix of travellers, ex-pats and a shitfaced mongolian who spoke pigeon German. The following day we returned to Beijing to give Matt his departing gift from China – the once in a lifetime opportunity to eat chilli-fried ducks heads. As we sat there crunching on the beaks and picking out the brains a local businessman came over to say hello. He was so impressed to see ‘whities’ eating this local delicacy that he invited us out for drinks. It looks like to get ahead here you just need to eat some head. Sorry. Appalling. Couldn’t resist.