Thanks so much for visiting us during our journey, Jim, Trina, Nick, Jesse, Catherine and Faith!
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November 18 - 19, 2006
November 18 --
Today was our Beijing tour day. After breakfast we set off with the rest of our group to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. We had a group photo taken at Tiananmen Square, and then went under the street to the entrance of the Forbidden City.
The Forbidden City was gigantic. The grounds are several hundred acres. There were so many “Hall of This” and “Hall of That” it was hard to keep track of. Trina and I were impressed at the size, but we’ve seen so many castles in our travels that we were ready to move on quickly. There had been a lot of restoration done, which was beautiful, and even more restoration was in progress. What we saw of the garden was nice, but we were told April and May are better because the flowers are in bloom then.
Once we were out of the Forbidden City we headed toward the Great Wall. We toured a jade factory on the way, and learned about the different grades of jade, and that jade comes in many more colors than just green. From the jade factory we stopped at a Friendship Store and had our first good meal. The food was excellent. We did some shopping and then got back on the bus to go to the Great Wall.
Now, the Great Wall was the best part of our trip to Beijing. We went to the Badaling section, which was crowded but wide enough for the many people that were there, and in great shape for climbing. Trina and I had so much fun here. We ended up going as far as we could climb. We stopped at the end of the road. The only way to go farther was to backtrack and take a tunnel out of the section we were in and walk a trail to the next one. There was a cool looking ride to the bottom of the mountain which we decided not to take, since our bus was parked at the top. I (Jim) had my first cup of coffee (cappuccino to be exact) since arriving in China, it was wonderful. Trina and I could have spent all day at the Wall, but we only had a few hours. Once you’ve climbed it, though, you realize that this was plenty of time. The pictures don’t do it justice.
Once we left the Wall we headed back into Beijing. Once again we stopped for dinner, this time at a different place. Good food, only the waitress didn’t want to refill my Coke. She wanted to charge me for a full bottle, when there were two that were 2/3 empty sitting to the side. Our tour guide, Sim, talked her into filling my glass again, but she didn’t look happy about it. There was a big fish tank when we walked in that had a big, ugly fish in it, so I took a picture for the kids.
We went back to the hotel and packed after dinner. We leave tomorrow to fly down to Nanning. Just two more days till Gotcha Day!
November 19 --
This morning Trina and I got up, had breakfast, and high-tailed it outside. We caught a cab back to Tiananmen Square to find a “Chairman Mao watch” for our friend Michelle. We were back to the hotel within the hour, watch in hand, and went to the market across the street to look for tanghulars (plums covered in sugar) for the kids. We thought the market was going to be small. Oh no, it was six floors, with different items being sold on each floor. Unfortunately, we didn’t find the tanghulars, so we went back to get ready to leave.
Sim ended up buying some tanghulars for us near his home. Hopefully they will last until we get home. We loaded everybody’s luggage onto a bus and headed for the airport. Once we had all checked in we went to the gate, only to find out our flight was delayed and our gate had changed. It was difficult since Sim had left us at security, and all the signs were in Chinese.
When we finally were ready to board, there was some confusion. Apparently some people had been waiting for their plane since 8:30 this morning (it was now almost 2:30 pm), and they thought they were taking the plane. The airport personnel didn’t know which flight was supposed to board, either. In the end, it was our flight. We all felt sorry for those other people, but glad to finally be on our way to Nanning and one step closer to our babies.
Our hotel in Nanning is unbelievable. Talk about luxurious. We’ll send a picture of it tomorrow. There was a glare from the lights tonight.
