On the train from Xi'an to Luoyang...every bit of land is farmed.

Vendors kept coming around selling us anything from gyroscopes to socks!

We were given packed lunches from the hotel made out of bologna, lettuce and a drippy, cold fried egg. ICK Fortunately, the lunch included an orange and two hard-boiled brown eggs.

They had just harvested corn so it was laid out to dry on roofs. It is not for animals...for cornmeal.

We saw surprisingly few farm animals.

Most farmland had ancestors' gravemarkers.

Brita had to sketch two pictures for each city as her Art homework.

Kaia caught up on her Algebra.

Mike, Susan and Bob sat with Peter.

We saw many caves where rural people were living.

Terraced farming everywhere

Garbage is just dumped along the RR tracks.

More caves and factories

Eliott keeping Mark occupied

Apartments were very rundown. Broken awnings and windows... laundry hanging outside.

There is a scarcity of lumber so all RR ties are made of cement. (I think the hotel beds in Luoyang are made out of cement, too.)

Vendors at a RR station