Today was the official last day in Xi’an for both of us. Corey has a flight home to Shanghai tomorrow and I bought a train ticket to Dunhuang through the hostel. I didn’t want to bother with cramming with hundreds of locals at the train station during holiday week to buy my train ticket. I paid an extra 30 yuan for the service. At times like this, its money well spent. The ticket cost 228 yuan in the end. It is a 26 hour sleeper train ride to Dunhuang the very north west of Gansu province. My ticket takes me to Liu Yuan and it will be another 120 kil to Dunhuang. My ticket tells me I arrive 8:20pm and I will have another 120 kil to go on a taxi. It is a bad idea to arrive so late at night, alone in an unfamiliar place. Somehow I was unable to get the train ticket goes directly from Xi’an to Dunhuang.
In preparation for the train ride I decided to travel like the locals and carry a snack bag. I went to the local supermarket chain store and bought food and water for my 26 hour journey. I forgot to bring something very important from US, my head lamp so I added a small handy flash light to my daily pack.
