Beijing

We made to Beijing safely after a looong flight. The boys did say it was the coolest flight ever as they had their own TV at their seat and could select from hundreds of movies, games, and music to listen to with their own headphones. And they served us Hagen Daaz Ice Cream as a snack. Yum…That’s worth 14 hours on a plane, right???



Today we visited Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City, and the Great Wall. Tiananmen Square is just that, a big open square courtyard in front of their capital building. It was big but when you think about tanks rolling across it, it didn’t seem big enough for that! No tanks today though, just lots of people. Even though they told us the crowd was low because it was their off season and we were there early in the morning (about 9AM).



Tiananmen Square is the beginning of the Forbidden City which is series of Palaces used by the Emperor’s in early dynasties. Some of the buildings had been restored and were beautifully carved on the outside. Others had not been restored but you could still see the intricate carvings. It is called Forbidden because they were so concerned with safety of the Emperor that you have to go through 3 sets of gates before you get to the building that the Emperor would actually live in.



After spending a couple of hours walking through the Forbidden City we had lunch at a local restaurant where Peking Duck was the specialty. They served a variety of dishes along with the duck including some chicken, pork, and beef dishes along with vegetables. They scrounged up a couple of forks for us chopstick challenged people. I tried I just couldn’t get them to work for me. Mike used a fork too. Derrick is the only one who managed with chopsticks. Dustin just didn’t eat. Had to give him protein bars when we got back on the bus. It was all very good (except the duck, I didn’t like it – Mike liked it though).

Then it was on to the Great Wall. The Great Wall is over 6,000 kilometers (that is 3700 miles for us metric challenged folk). Only about 200 kilometers or 124 miles are in Beijing. We had a choice of the challenging climb or the easy climb with the harder one giving you a better view from farther up so of course that is the one we took. We climbed up about ¼ to ½ mile of steps to the first tower and that was quite the chore. The steps were extremely steep and uneven. Some you had to really raise your feet high and others were barely an inch high. The railing to hold on to (and pull yourself along) was right at the stair level so you walked stooped over pulling yourself up the stairs with the railing (at least I did). I think we rested about 4 times on that small section. The view was great though. There was still snow on the edges of the steps though so you had to watch your step going down. Especially since our legs were shaky from the climb up!



After leaving the Great Wall we stopped by for a couple of minutes to see the Olympic Stadium that Beijing built special for the 2008 Summer Olympics. It was a very cool looking building. We didn’t get to go in but we got to take a few photos.



Then it was back to the hotel to write post cards and blogs and eat dinner. We opted for a quiet dinner in our room with Pizza Hut. Yes, they have then over here. They told me most people like them better than in the USA. It would not be the Swanigan’s saying that though. There was no sauce (it was just bread and cheese) and the cheese was all mozzarella (no blend) so it was extremely chewy. It was ok I guess but I’ll stick to our way of making pizza thank you very much.

Well, we leave for Guangzhou in the morning at 5:45 (we have to have our luggage to the bell hop at 5AM) so I’d better get to bed. Monday is the day we get Paige so not too much longer now!