Xi'an in 2 days: the Terracotta Warriors, the city wall and the Muslim Quarter

After Shanghai and Beijing, Xi’an is the city Australians most often ask us to add, and for one reason: the Terracotta Army. It is also the ancient capital of China for a thousand years, the eastern end of the Silk Road, a walled city you can cycle around, and home to a street-food culture unlike anything in the east. Two days is enough to do it properly; this is the plan we use as an extension to the Shanghai to Beijing tour.

Getting there

• From Beijing: high-speed train from Beijing West to Xi’an North in about four and a half hours, city centre to city centre. This is the natural order: Shanghai, train to Beijing, train to Xi’an, fly home from Xi’an or back via Shanghai.
• From Shanghai: about two and a half hours by air, or six hours by high-speed train from Hongqiao to Xi’an North, which is a comfortable working day in first class and avoids two airports. The train guide applies.
• Xi’an North station is 30 to 40 minutes north of the walled city by car or on metro line 2, which runs straight down to the Bell Tower. Xianyang airport is about an hour north-west.

Before you go: the one booking that matters

The Terracotta Army (Emperor Qinshihuang’s Mausoleum Site Museum) sells timed, real-name tickets online, linked to your passport, with a daily cap that is reached on holidays and most weekends. Book the day the window opens for the earliest slot. Everything else in Xi’an is easier: the Shaanxi History Museum is free but also needs a passport booking (and is closed on Mondays); the wall, the pagodas and the Muslim Quarter are walk-up.

Day 1: the Terracotta Army and Huaqing

7.30 am, leave the city. The site is about an hour east by car, past the tomb mound of the First Emperor. Arriving at opening with the first timed slot is the difference between standing at the rail of Pit 1 in silence and standing behind three coach groups.

Pit 1 first, the hangar-sized hall with the main army in formation, more than a thousand soldiers excavated and thousands more still in the ground; walk the full circuit, then the rear where the restorers piece new figures together from fragments. Pit 3, the small command post, and Pit 2, where the archers, chariots and cavalry are still mostly buried, follow. The exhibition hall with the two bronze chariots is the finish; they are half-size, exquisite, and the quiet room most groups skip.

A guide earns their fee here more than almost anywhere in China: the pits are unlabelled from the rail, the story of the discovery by well-digging farmers in 1974, the ranks and the weapons, the reason the figures were painted and why the paint flakes on contact with air, the mausoleum that has never been opened; none of it is on a sign. Allow three hours.

Lunch in the site’s restaurant area is fine; better is the village food street outside the gate for biangbiang noodles.

Afternoon: Huaqing Palace, the hot-spring pleasure gardens of Tang emperors at the foot of Mount Li, 15 minutes back toward the city. Pretty, historically rich (a 20th-century political drama played out in one of its pavilions), and a gentle hour after the intensity of the pits. The evening show staged there, The Song of Everlasting Sorrow, is enormous and over the top and some guests love it; it runs in the warmer months.

Evening: the Muslim Quarter. Back in the walled city, the lanes behind the Drum Tower are the Hui Muslim quarter and the best street food in northern China: roujiamo (braised beef or lamb in a crisp flatbread, the original burger), yangrou paomo (lamb broth over torn bread, you tear it yourself), biangbiang noodles (wide, hand-pulled, with chilli oil), liangpi cold noodles, skewers, persimmon cakes and walnut sweets. Eat standing, at a counter, then at a table, in that order. The Great Mosque, a 1,300-year-old mosque built entirely in Chinese style, is in the middle of the lanes and open to visitors outside prayer times.

Day 2: the museum, the wall and the pagoda

9 am, Shaanxi History Museum. One of the great museums in China: the Zhou bronzes, the Qin and Han galleries, and above all the Tang dynasty rooms, with the gold and silver hoard and the murals from imperial tombs. Two hours with a guide; the free tickets need a passport booking, and Mondays are closed.

Late morning, the Big Wild Goose Pagoda, built in the seventh century to hold the sutras the monk Xuanzang brought back from India, in a temple park south of the museum; climb it if the queue is short, otherwise walk the park and the square.

Afternoon, the City Wall. Xi’an’s Ming-dynasty wall is the most complete in China: 14 kilometres around, wide enough for a road on top, and you can hire a bicycle at the South Gate and ride the whole loop in about 90 minutes, or do the southern half and climb down at the East or West Gate. Late afternoon light on the rooftops of the old city below is the Xi’an photograph. A tandem makes it a family activity.

Last evening. The Bell Tower and Drum Tower lit up, dinner at a restaurant on the quieter streets south of the Bell Tower (Shaanxi cuisine beyond the street food: lamb, noodles, wild greens, sour and spicy), or the Tang Paradise park’s lantern-lit evening if you have the energy.

Where to stay

Inside the walls, near the Bell Tower or the South Gate: everything on day two is walkable, the Muslim Quarter is ten minutes, and the metro to the station is at the door. International hotels (Sofitel, Grand Hyatt, Westin) sit just outside the wall to the south-east and are also fine; the courtyard-style boutique hotels inside the wall are the atmospheric choice. Avoid the high-tech zone and the area near the station.

With children

The pits hold children from about six; younger ones find them repetitive after twenty minutes, so plan the guide’s commentary for the adults and a run around the outer park for the child. The wall by tandem bicycle and the Muslim Quarter’s sweets are the children’s highlights. The museum is for ten and up.

Seasons

April to May and September to October are the months: mild, clear, the wall in good light. July and August are hot and the pits are air-conditioned only in the sense of being roofed. Winter is cold and dry and the site is empty, which is a fair trade. Avoid the first week of October and Chinese New Year, when the cap on tickets is reached before the day begins; the best time to visit guide has the holiday dates.

How it fits a route

The most common extension is Shanghai 3 nights, Beijing 3 nights, Xi’an 2 nights, with the train between all three and a flight home from Xi’an (via Shanghai or Guangzhou) or a flight back to Shanghai for a last night on the Bund. We quote it as an add-on to the seven-day tour with the same guide-and-car model, the pit tickets booked under your passports, and a Xi’an guide who has stood at that rail a thousand times and still finds something new. Tell us your dates on the contact page and we will fit it in.