Luoyang, Henan, China
November 16, 2013
Well following a heavy night on the rice wine the night before I dragged myself up and hopped on the subway to the train station to head off to Luoyang.
I didn’t realise the train I had booked was the Bullet train which was really impressive and put the fast train I got that time from St Petersburg to Moscow to shame. We cruised along at a nippy 240km/h even though these bad boys are capable of over 300km/h!!! it was really smooth as well and it only took about 3 hours to cover the distance to Luoyang. It was nice and chilled tootling along, with my music on my phone and some pretty decent views out the window of rural China.
A quick and cheap Taxi ride got me from the station to the Hostel no bother and I got myself in and sorted. It was just after tea time so I popped out for a bite to eat round the corner at a little street stall. The food here seems even cheaper than it was in Xi’an and you can notice a slight difference in the tastes with the ingredients they use. I grabbed a few beers from the corner shop and sat in the Hostel getting to know a few people here. It’s mainly local Chinese staying in this hostel with very few travelers around but they are all really nice and friendly, even if I don’t understand them all the time. I noticed when I went out for my food and also driving from the train station that there aren’t many westerners around here, in fact outside of the Hostel I haven’t seen a single one, not a soul, just locals and you do feel like you stand out a lot.
I caught up with a few friends online then turned in ready for an early start to get the bus in the morning to go and see the Longman Grottoes, the main reason I have come to Luoyang.
I was up and sorted early doors and on a bus before 9am heading out of town to Longman. I got most of the way about 2 stops from the end when I put my hand in my pocket to discover it was empty and my was phone gone. The bus was really busy, standing room all the way and there were three youngish lads behind me who I challenged and searched their pockets but to no avail. I’m pretty sure it was them unless it was someone else who walked past me but I couldn’t find anything on them no matter how much I searched them.
I’m pretty gutted to say the least. I haven’t turned my phone on properly since I left the UK but its used as a wifi device and I’ve pretty much lived out of it for the past couple of months. It’s really handy for copying my hostel booking addresses in Chinese out into a notepad so I can show the drivers in Taxis etc, my Google maps still works in English on it as opposed to Chinese on my laptop. The same as a few of the other websites I use to book my trains etc so I feel really lost without it and it will make the rest of my trip harder to plan.
So unfortunately there was no visit to the Grottoes and Shaolin Temple for me today. I needed to get my phone blocked and change a few passwords for certain apps etc. Once back at the hostel I couldn’t make an international call to T-mobile so had to buy some Skype credit and struggle with the slow connection they have here before I got through. I’ve changed all my other passwords and stuff so it should be ok. It took a few hours due to the crap internet speed in here and I wasn’t in the best of moods so I just took a wander around the old town this afternoon for a bit food and to try and cheer myself up.
Hopefully I can get my address for my next hostel in Zhangjiajie printed out when they finally fix the printer in the hostel and hopefully I should get to the Grottoes tomorrow now so fingers crossed.
