China, Day 2, Part 1 (Still in Beijing)

Day 2 in Beijing got started at 8 am with a drive to the Pearl Factory tour. I learned all about cultured pearls and have never seen so many pearls in one place in my entire life! They were lovely. Again, it was a shopping opportunity, I looked but did not buy.
Next, we were to walk through the Summer Palace of some Emperor or another. They are all jumbled in my head. It was a lovely lake area. There were no leaves on the trees and there was ice on the lake, but there were spots of beauty around. There is no fishing or swimming in this spring-fed lake, as they wish to keep it pure. Paddle boats are rented in the summer, however (we saw them moored).


I believe this below is the palace in the distance. That's Suzette on the side, snapping a photo. Notice we are still in our heavy winter gear. Cold wind, cold temps.


There are actually quite a few kites in the air in the photo below. About 6, I believe. It was fun to see those.
And here are a group of Chinese people just singing together in the morning for the joy and fun of it. Kind of like exercise for the soul, our guide said (Tai Chi being the exercise for the body).

Chinese sidewalk art. Painting with water and a brush on the sidewalk. Calligraphy--to show off one's skills in this ancient Chinese art.

We walked through some garden areas after this and saw myriads of paintings and statues and lots and lots of tourists. Berenice was plenty tuckered out after this walk. We probably meandered through here for close to an hour. She tried buying some post cards from a vendor outside the Summer Palace gates. We were told that we could bargain with them and that usually half what they offer is sufficient. It worked for me nicely at the beginning when I bought a nice tour-guide book for the Summer Palace. He asked ten, I paid 5. Not so good with Berenice when the lady asked for "One Dolla!" for one set of post cards, Berenice asked if she could get BOTH sets. Then she wanted to see what the photos were on the post cards. Then the lady insisted that ONE set was "One Dolla!" She would not give in and let her buy two for a dollar. So I said, "Just forget it. Our group is leaving us. We have to keep moving. Give her back the post cards and get your dollar back." But that lady had a very firm grip on that dollar bill and would not give it back when Berenice tried returning those cards. So she got one set for one dollar. And they are nice post cards, I'm sure. I don't like shopping and I ESPECIALLY don't like THAT kind of shopping! That was about my only successful experience in shopping in China (the guide book on the Summer Palace)

China, Day one, Part 3

Here are views from our hotel window. It was a Crown Plaza, very 5 star and quite nice.
The view to the left (above) and to the right (below).
Below is the big arena they nick-named "The Birds Nest" from Olympic games.

I'm a terrible blogger. I can't keep all these things in order. It's backwards, you know. So, recap of day one in Beijing (on two hours of rest in the hotel upon arrival on Sunday night/Monday morning):
First Stop, Temple of Heaven. My camera was too cold or something and not working. There's photos on the video we have, though. We walked through lots of grounds and trees and icy walkways. There were people doing Tai Chi in the park--all bundled up just like we were. There were also couples (mostly older ones) dancing a waltz-type dance in the park. It was a fairly long little walk through the grounds to get to the buildings. The Temple of Heaven was a round building, there was a court yard and other rectangular ones, too. I think the walk's length was kind of surprising to Berenice. She was tired out already! But she never complained. Crossing the street was tricky, too. Lots of traffic, very little regard for rules. Actually, I read in one guide book, "Traffic rules in China are Vague and generally ignored." True.

Second stop: Jade Factory tour. This was mostly a shopping stop. We looked, did not buy (but some did in our group). It was very expensive.

Third Stop: Ming Tombs.
Fourth Stop: Lunch. Chinese Food! Imagine that! It was good and we ate lots of it.
Fifth stop: Great Wall
Sixth stop: The Birds's nest for pictures.
Then a quick trip to the hotel for a bathroom break and to drop off our one member who had become quite ill at this point. She didn't come to dinner with us. We postponed our special Peking duck meal until she could join us.
Dinner somewhere, I don't recall.

Bedtime was early because we were beat!

The hardest thing about this whole trip was NOT USING THE WATER FOR TEETH-BRUSHING! Honestly, I had to go into camping mode whenever I did that little chore that is SO easy with running tap water. But it was a no-no. We could wash and shower in it, but not brush teeth, rinse or wet toothbrushes or mouth with it. So it was bottled water for that. In a cup. It was just hard to remember. We drank bottled water all the time, and I never quite had enough, quite frankly. And we always has Sprite at all our meals. The other options were beer or Coca Cola. So-- no water, no ice. It wasn't awful, but ice in the cups would have been nicer.

More Great Wall pictures

If you look closely at the one above, I think you can see two ridges of the wall. And on the one below, too. That's our photographer. I don't recall her name, but she was a videographer and they sold us a video of our two days in Beijing. Berenice bought one. I've viewed it. It's a nice document of where we were. Well, it's just a great document of the fact that we were THERE! It still seems rather like a dream. Notice all the bus parking and many buildings in the area below where we walked up from.

Every brick that was over a hole (drainage?) in the wall had this decoration in them.
And, yes. They were steep. And icy. I think that's the fellows on the roof having a grand ol' time.

China, Day 1, Part 2

Day one actually started at a place called the Temple of Heaven, right in Beijing Proper. I know I took pictures there, but I don't seem to be able to find them right now. So we'll move on to the Great Wall. Stop One was Temple of Heaven. Stop 2 was the Ming Tombs. Then we went to the Great Wall. As you can see from the pictures (which are not in order, sorry) it was very cold and windy. Berenice sat that one out in the bus and the rest of us hiked up it a bit. We had close to an hour there, maybe an hour and a half. And we are running on 2 hours of sleep/rest from the long travel to get there. We were on the road/in the air for about 50 hours we figured. Between flight delays and just long distances, it was an exhausting trip just to get there! Very.

The first picture is kind of funny to me. There was a big group of Indian or Pakistani fellows who were all dancing and singing around on the top of this guard house. They were so friendly and talkative as I passed them on my way down. So many tourists, and it's not even the peak season!
But I sure never thought I'd see myself hiking up the Great Wall of China. Above is a view of one of the towers/gates/buildings that we walked up to, around and back down. I didn't realize until after that we could have turned right and gone up the other side. You can see the wall heading off in one direction that way. Don't ask me what direction. I have no idea.
There were lots of buildings in this particular gate area. Whole settlements were here, providing the great number of guards, they brought their families, so it was populated--schools, temples, etc. And now there is bus parking and restrooms and tourist gift shops, too.


A camel was walking by down below us. Just kind of random.
Another tourist had dressed up in some "Mulan" type costume for picture taking. There were many tourists, but can you imagine how busy and crowded it is on a warm summer day? Wow. Masses, I'm sure. China is really pushing tourism these days to select spots and this is one hot spot here. Many of the tourists are Chinese and many more are from other oriental countries.
This is two members of our small group of SEVEN! That's right. Only 7 in our tour group. So small and comfortable and they helped keep a slower pace and watch out for Berenice.

Looking through one of the tower windows.

China, Day 1, Part 1

Beijing. Ming Tombs. Stairs, carvings, snow and ice. It'd snowed the day before in Northern China and Beijing and this day the wind was blowing and it was cold. This is in the outskirts of Beijing, about a 30 minute or more drive. It's hilly and there were orchards on the way. It's a big contrast from the bustling City!
The buildings are large, cavernous, cold and ornate. These are just a few of the buildings in the complex that is the Ming Tombs. There are burial places for 13 of the Ming Dynasty emperors, and they are scattered in amongst the hills and vales. We just went to one of the emperor's tomb areas that contained his big statue and some jewelry, artifacts, relief map of the area and some other displays and such. Even a model boat. Apparently they were sailors, too! Who knew?

The buildings are open, contain massive pillars. It's made of wood with glazed yellow tiles on roof. Yellow and Gold are the emperor/royal colors.

The steps, cold and walking were a bit much for my Mother-in-law, so she sat in a sunny spot out of the wind and out of the shady, cave-like building while I wandered through to see the exhibits.
These are drums. They were used in the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics in 2008.