China Trip!!

Hi All, So we are home from our trip, and mostly over the jet lag. What an exciting time!! We loved it! I could tell you stories for hours of everything that happened, but since my space is limited, I’ll just give you a short description, and some unforgettable points.
Day 1: we arrived in Beijing and had the adventure of finding our hotel via subway! Thankfully a nice man could speak both English and Cantonese (The Chinese dialect that Dale speaks), and helped us find our way. It took nearly three hours!! Once in the hotel, we all crashed! The “boys” went out later that night and found a street market that sold live scorpions (you pick the live ones and they fry them up in front of you! YUM!)
Day 2: We explored the nearby attractions Tiananmen Square, and the Forbidden City. The amounts of people in these areas made the subway encounters from the previous night seem like nothing!! Apparently 16 million people live in Beijing, and nearly 19 million work there.
Day 3: We embarked on a very interesting tour of a Jade Museum and Shop, the Ming Tombs, and The Great Wall. “Ellie” was our guide, and she was very informative! We learned a lot. The section of the Great Wall we visited is the most popular section (Michael Jordan climbed this section when he visited!!) and that is apparent in the photos.
Day 4: Another Flight, to Guangzhou. That afternoon we walked around the “People’s Park” and enjoyed traditional Chinese gatherings of exercise, dance, singing and games. The parks are the life of the party! That evening we had dinner with Dale’s cousin and her family that still live in the area.
Day 5: Another view of traditional Chinese culture with a trip to a Folk Art Museum, The Guangdong Museum in the Guangzhou Yue Xui Park, and the Sun yat-sen Memorial Hall. Dinner again with the family, this time Chinese – we all got strange looks and cheers for trying to eat with chopsticks!!
Day 6: Bus ride to Taishan, and a visit to the rural village where Dale’s grandmother lived, and his mother was born.
Day 7: Trip to Dale’s village, and the house still in the family. He brought a feast for the remaining villagers, and we chose household items to take home with us. These two days were the most educational! It was exciting to learn how things are different now for villages, yet still so far off from what we are accustomed to.
Day 8: Bus ride to Hong Kong. We spent the afternoon and evening exploring the city and shopping at a few of the many street markets.
Day 9: We took a ferry across the bay to Hong Kong Island and rode a tram car up to the top of Victoria’s Peak. After enjoying the spectacular views of the city and bay below we stumbled upon a Zoological and Botanical Gardens with many tropical plants and an Aviary and Primate exhibits. After taking the ferry back to Kowloon, we enjoyed a wonderful Chinese dinner, and then went back to the bay to watch a laser light show to music put on by the buildings along the bay on the island. Very beautiful!! Then – More Shopping!!
Day ten concluded the trip with a very long flight back!

It was a jammed-packed couple of weeks, but we wouldn’t change it for anything. Check out the Photo Albums and videos listed on the Bottom of the Right-hand Column. The pictures are worth a thousand words!! Make sure you have plenty of time to look, there is a lot to take in!! (as we learned from the trip!)