The sights of Zhangye

Today I have had my fix of sights. I started off this morning in search of the largest indoor reclining buddha in China. Thankfully I had the foresight to look up the CHinese name on the internet yesterday to aid me in my search (what did people do before the internet?). Explaining that it was 2 blocks away was clearly too much for the girls in the hotel and they suggested I take a cab for 3 kwai. They are not very keen on maps over here, it would have been a very simple map to draw - 2 blocks south, one block west....anyway I found it (on foot).

I was expecting to be thoroughly underwhelmed. The "biggest", "best", "most amazing" tags usually are over hyped. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. There were lots of smaller buildings with old and not so old buddhas in. This earth pagoda which was quite impressive

And an immense reclining buddha. I walked into the room which houses it and looked around wondering where they'd hidden it. Turns out I was staring at it...the room wasn't too big so you walk in staring at its belly. It was impressive despite being shrouded in scaffolding for renovation. Apparently Marco Polo himself saw this very same buddha on his travels.



I have also seen my first pigeons. Those of you who know me will know what an aversion I have to pigeons and how much they tend to like me (or more specifically pooing on me). So it was with some trepidation that I walked through a flock of pigeons and doves (which I decided are just as gross as pigeons) to reach this wooden pagoda. Since there are hardly any birds in the Chinese cities (a hangover from the 70s when people were given quotas to kill so as to make their cities "modern") the novelty clearly hadn't worn off and there were small children letting the birds crawl all over them....grim. Once the trauma of the birds had worn off I climbed the 110 steps to the top.

From the top you could almost see the mountains if you squint through the atmospheric haze (aka pollution - which incidentally is much better, but the locals are still wearing face masks and so am I). This is the view to the west.