{"id":8037,"date":"2016-01-21T05:59:02","date_gmt":"2016-01-21T13:59:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/?p=8037"},"modified":"2016-01-26T08:01:33","modified_gmt":"2016-01-26T16:01:33","slug":"day-trip-to-xian-from-beijing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/2016\/01\/day-trip-to-xian-from-beijing\/","title":{"rendered":"Day trip to Xi’An (from Beijing)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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You have a spare day while you are in Beijing. You are in the mood for an excursion that is a bit adventurous. Think Xi’An, the city that is a couple of thousand years older than Beijing, home to the Terra-cotta Warriors, and famous for its lamb noodles.<\/p>\n

You’re game? This is how to do it.<\/p>\n

Check out of your hotel the day before your planned trip and book the over-night sleeper train<\/a> to Xi’An. You embark from Beijing West station (\u00e5\u0152\u2014\u00e4\u00ba\u00ac\u00e8\u00a5\u00bf\u00e7\u00ab\u2122). The fare is around RMB400 (per person, about US$60) for the “soft bed cabin” which take 4 people. If you like a bit more pampering, there is a “deluxe cabin” that is not listed for sale. It is a 2-bed cabin, with attached private bathroom, that is nearly twice the price. The train arrives in Xi’An early the next morning, around 8am.<\/p>\n

Someone should arrange a tour guide and a car\/driver there for you beforehand. Since this is a tourist city, they are quite reasonable. The tour guide<\/a> costs about RMB400 and the car\/driver about RMB800. So this is about US$200.<\/p>\n

To come back, there are two options: the same sleeper train takes about 12 hours. You would embark around 7pm and arrive Beijing around 7am. Or you can take one of the high-speed trains<\/a> which takes about 6 hours. They depart hourly from 4pm and cost about RMB800 (US$120).<\/p>\n

This itinerary requires no luggage other than light toiletries, and is quite affordable. For two people, including the tour-guide, it costs between US$400 and US$600, plus foods, drinks, and souvenirs.<\/p>\n

All that for a whole day in one of the oldest cities in the world. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You have a spare day while you are in Beijing. You are in the mood for an excursion that is a bit adventurous. Think Xi’An, the city that is a couple of thousand years older than Beijing, home to the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[77,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8037"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8037"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8058,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8037\/revisions\/8058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nomadicminds.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}