The Trip- Part 1

Beijing




Pictures From Beijing   


Melissa and Brevin came up the night before we left. They spent the night and ensured that Les and I did not kill each other in the last, frantic moments of packing. ( And let me just say here that the Fe-breeze room refresher and the Downy De-wrinkler were two of the best items I packed- so there!)
We all woke early and headed off. Breakfast at Bob Evans was a great idea and we got on the plane with our tummies full of pancakes and sausage gravy- not a bad start to the trip.
What can I say about the air travel? It is long and tiring and boring. Eventually we made it to Beijing though and I was bowled over by the heat. As a matter of fact, I never did adjust to it. It continued to be hellishly hot and humid for our entire trip but the weather in Beijing was "special" as our guide, George told us many, many times.
We stayed in the Holiday Inn, right down town. It was a nice hotel with a good breakfast buffet and it was near a good pizza joint. This is also where we went out to have authentic Chinese Dumplings for dinner one night. This was probably the single most stressful meal there. The food was good but we had about 10 of the workers standing and watching us while we ate- for the entire meal. They also wanted to touch Ev alot and had many, many , questions that they wanted answered. All in all they were friendly and encouraging,  it's just hard to eat while being scrutinized. The dumplings were delicious though.

Beijing is big and busy and hot. When you enter Hong Kong, you could be in any city in the world, when you enter Beijing, you KNOW you are in China. There is alot of smog and alot of street pollution and it is wonderfully Chinese in every nook and cranny. Also? It was hot, did I mention that?

CCAI has some pretty serious touring set up here, you really have no break at all. It starts at 8:30 am and you go and go until 6 or so at night. This is why Ev was asleep on Les at the end of every day.

Day 1 we went to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City with a lunch and then off to the Hutong neighborhood.  I wish that I could tell you that I fully enjoyed these stops but the heat was so oppressive that I just survived it all. It was gorgeous and awesome and magnificent but I was near passing out the entire time. I know! I should stop belly aching about the heat already- but it WAS bad. Everyone said so. We were ALL miserable and sweating like pigs and just dying of thirst. Even our native guide-so there.

Day 2 was The Great Wall. I could not believe this place it was fabulous and it was so amazing to be there. Les made it nearly to the top but I have to say, Ev and I did not. We sat and enjoyed the view, we found a breezy spot and had a snack or two.

The entire time I had this whole pulse of anxiety going on in my head. I wanted Liam and I wanted to be done with the endless sightseeing and being drug all over. I think that I will always feel this way. It was nice to be distracted, on one hand though.

On Day 3 we woke early to get to the airport and head into Henan Province and into Zhengzhou City where we would meet our son. Unfortunately we would have to be there almost an entire day before we could get him!