Chang'an

We have arrived in Chang'an, the capital of China. It is a simply amazing city. It is in fact the largest city we have visited so far with a population of over 2 million people. I couldn't even imagine that many people living in one city. We met with a naval admiral while in Chang'an who talked about his one of his trips. He said, "The Emperor...has ordered us He and others at the head of several tens of thousands of officers and flag-troops to ascend more than one hundred large ships to go and confer presents on them in order to make manifest the transforming power of the (imperial) virtue and to treat distant people with kindness. From the third year of Yongle till now we have seven times received the commission of ambassadors to countries of the western ocean. The barbarian countries which we have visited are: by way of Zhancheng (Champa), Zhaowa (Java), Sanfoqi (Palembang) and Xianlo (Siam) crossing straight over to Xilanshan (Ceylon) in South India, Guli (Calicut), and Kezhi (Cochin), we have gone to the western regions Hulumosi (Hormuz), Adan (Aden), Mugudushu (Mogadishu), altogether more than thirty countries large and small. We have traversed more than one hundred thousand li of immense water spaces and have beheld in the ocean huge waves like mountains rising sky-high, and we have set eyes on barbarian regions far away hidden in a blue transparency of light vapours, while our sails loftily unfurled like clouds day and night continued their course (rapid like that) of a star, traversing those savage waves as if we were treading a public thoroughfare. Truly this was due to the majesty and the good fortune of the Court and moreover we owe it to the protecting virtue of the divine Celestial Spouse." We were much impressed with his journeys since he visited so many other areas than us. We also talked about some of the regions we both visited such as Palembang, Calicut, and Java. He was impressed with our knowledge and used his influence to get us a special treat. He was going to award us with "Heavenly Horses" from the nomadic Xiongnu in Central Asia. These were the horses of choice for the Chinese military. Whilst in Chang'an we purchased silk, bamboo, gunpowder, ginger, and paper. We know the gunpowder will be particularly useful in the Greeks fight against the Ottoman Turks. We just hope we can get it to them in time before all of Greece is overrun. The city is so amazing we are disappointed that we have to leave. We also get plenty of food to travel with. While we will be going fairly fast, we still pack 4 months of food just in case. We also get plenty of water so we don't have a repeat of our other dehydration experiences. We estimate it will take us about 90 days to get from Chang'an to our next trade stop in Dunhuang. We will have to traverse light mountains, many hills, and we will also have to cross the Yellow River just to get there. We just hope these Heavenly Horses are all they are made out to be. They do have quite a reputation and we sure hope they live up to it. We have heard the great Genghis Khan had one and they also are said to, "being able to gallop 1,000 kilometers a day and another 800 kilometers at night." I doubt thats true but anywhere near that will still be great. Zhang Chien said, "The population is agricultural and resident. They grow rice and wheat, make wine from grapes and have many good horses. The horses sweat blood and originate from the heavenly horses." He was referring to towns in the Western Chinese Empire where we were headed next. We are now setting off to make our long journey to the outskirts of China, Dunhuang. 

 A few of our new Horses.
http://www.horse-protection.org/images/horses01.jpg