Interesting tidbit...
On yesterday's tour, we had people from England, Australia,and India with us.
Today we had England, Manchuria (I think), Bulgaria (but currently living in CA), Spain, Germany, and Canada. We were a very diverse group!
We were picked up this morning about 7:15. To say we had a full day was an understatement for sure. We started with the Forbidden City.
(yes it is HOT - We were thankful it was overcast today. I can't imagine surviving a day like we had if it had been sunny.
Up next was Summer Palace. This calligrapher was just hanging out on the sidewalk doing his thing.
Beautiful lotus flowers all along the walkway.
The walkway at the Summer Palace was presented to us as the longest covered walkway in the world at 738 (?) meters. It has over 14,000 paintings similar to the one below lining the ceiling it's entire length.
We ended our time there with a dragon boat ride across the lake. Hope helped pay for our ride.
We are getting these little hand hearts every time one of us asks for a picture these days.
Lunch was at a pearl market. First a demo....
...then we eat.
After lunch our guide took us to a silk factory. Always remember all the thread for clothing, etc, comes from single cocoons. BUT, the quilts are made from the silk of double cocoons. I need to look through some of the video from our tour to check these numbers, but I think if the thread was unwound from one cocoon, it's length is something crazy like 1500 meters. I forget how many cocoons it takes to make one silk layer for the quilts, but then each quilt has 75-80 layers. Cool
Silk Worms
Cacoon
Stretching the Silk
Temple of Heaven was up next.
Entertainment at the Entrance - Interesting Instruments
Hope with Liu Liu our guide for today.
Lastly for today - Tea Ceremony
Mmmmmm! Jasmine Tea
And so ends day two. We are pretty worn out. Our bodies haven't adjusted to the time yet. Hope woke up this morning wide awake at 3:00. She has been a remarkable traveler! She fell asleep n the bus ride back to our hotel at about 6:00 and she has not yet woken up. We couldn't even wake her to feed her some dinner...and if you know Hope, she is ALWAYS hungry. Hopefully she'll just sleep through the night now. One can wish such things, yes?
Have a great day at home. You'll all be just waking up to start the day I suppose. Hope all is well. Has it continued to be stifling high temps there too? Have we had any rain?
Posts
6 comments:
Yesterday it was a bit cooler which was nice. We got some rain in Roseville but on the news they showed some places got a good amount and some didn't, so not sure about B-(your hometown), WI.
Love the pics! Praying she sleeps through the night. Can you get a swim at the hotel? Swimming is supposed to help with jetlag.
Love ya!
What a full day of wonderful sites and sounds. Thanks for being such a good blogger. We love following along. Give Hope a hug/kiss from G&G. Yes, we got some rain. Not much though.
Love,
MOM
Love to you guys! Thank you so much for blogging! It's so much fun to follow along! I'm getting anxious to see another little face in these pics!!! As I'm sure you are as well. :) Soon, very soon! Keep 'em coming! Tell Ron that Chris enjoyed the sword pics. lol
Of course! I hope you are sleeping soundly and that everyone sleeps a lot longer than 3am!
C, C, and M.
It's cooler here today, I think your area has receved some rain. Danika has been avidly checking your blog looking for "Hope photos" and is very anxiously awaiting Hope & Luke photos (we're using your blog as a reward system for her : )
Praying for continued safety on your journey. So wish I was there with you!
Love following along with you guys on your journey. Looks like there are so many exciting things for you to see and do, also looks very hot. Can't wait to see Luke in some pictures soon. Get some sleep before the little guy joins you.
So cool to see Hope at all of these historical landmark's in China - she looks like she is having the time of her life.
Post a Comment