Best day in Beijing.

It's 4:30 AM and we are wide awake.  We did go to bed at 9:30 PM though. The time change hasn't been as hard as I thought it would be but we do feel a little funky.  Everyone says it's worse on the way back.  Yesterday was one of the best days of my life to date.  I didn't have the ability to take really good photos until later in the day because I forgot a memory card for my camera(duh!) and also a card reader(!!!) but we're working on that.  So all I've got to share from today was taken with my phone.  I'll post my better pictures later.  We were met by our guide and driver at our hotel in the morning and jumped in the van and headed out to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall.  The drive there took us through Beijing and out through the outskirts for about an hour and a half.  The freeways feel strangely normal.  Everyone drives on the same side as in the US and in nice cars.  But once you get out of the city you start to see the difference.  Homes are strange little buildings or "shantyvilles" where you are sure no one could be living but then you see someone standing in the doorway or shuffling down the alley.   There are also SO many construction projects that are stuck incomplete.  Half finished buildings or homes with signs on them about how lovely or cool they are - instead of the skeleton frames with plastic waving in the wind that they actually are.

 The Great Wall was amazing and hard to comprehend.  The section we went to had a cable car - which is awesome because it's on top of a mountain!  This part was completed in 1409 and was really mind blowing.  We walked and hiked along it for about an hour and a half - having our picture taken by and with Chinese folks.  What are they going to do with those I wonder?  If made us feel like celebrities.  We felt cool to climb to the "top" of our section - it looks impossible high with stairs that seem to go on forever. You can see it in the background.

A Chinese guy stopped Mike and said, "Ahh, German!"  We think he was trying to guess where Mike was from - he seemed very confused when Mike said, "Oh, I'm American."  He does kinda look German though.  The Chinese people are very friendly and all say hello and smile where ever we go.

These are the little buildings along the wall.  Pretty cool.

We kept looking at each other and saying, "We're in China on the Great Wall!"  Felt so strange.

After the wall we drove down and had lunch in a little place - it was a nicer restaurant and the food was good even though it was new.  Something we have come to discover is that unless its a western hotel, Chinese buildings are freezing!  I guess not everyone is able to pretend like it's not winter by cranking the central heat up.

After lunch our guide took us to a silk "factory".  We were game only to discover it was a serious tourist trap.  The girl inside led us by the museum and demonstration part of the silk making process at lightening pace and we couldn't figure out why until they took us into the room full of bedding that looked exactly like bed bath and beyond. ;)  We were then led into a maze of other rooms of silk pajamas and silk clothing and silk everything under the sun.  It wasn't so much a museum but a silk department store.  Still interesting but not really the experience we were hoping for.

Here are the silk worms in their cocoons.  So cool.  You just start pulling on the strings hanging off and you can unwind them and then stick them on a loom to make thread.

Oh yeah, after you get the larva out.  Gross!  Sorry once again for the poor quality - all I had was my phone.

After that we headed back to the hotel and were tempted to take a nap but decided that we would regret that since it was really our only day in Beijing.  I'm so grateful we resisted(thanks to Excedrin) and headed out again because it proved to be one of the best afternoons ever.  We wanted to get to the Forbidden City - the former home or complex of the emperors of China - but it was late and we needed to hurry.  We called the concierge and he told us they had bikes for rent and we jumped on that.  SO GREAT!!!  We joined the locals and hopped on our bikes riding around town.  We didn't make it to the city before it closed which ended up being kinda great.  We rode around town and down alleys and through Beijing and it was perfect.  We were a sight to see as we rode along surpised families all piled onto one bike.  Everyone was out because it's still the Chinese New Year holiday so the streets were full of happy locals.  By then I had my camera going and took some great shots but I still don't have a way to get them on the computer - I'll go see if I can't find a card reader once the stores have opened up here. 

Once we got back to the hotel a couple hours later one of my great friend's parents and brother,who are also our friends;) Christine and Doug Brown and their son Ian were waiting for us.  We all headed over to the mall - which is super nice and full of fancy american stores.  We ate at a dumpling restuarant.  Ian and his wife Hilary and his three kids live in Beijing and he speaks fluent Mandarin so he ordered great food for us all.  It was a super yummy meal and then we walked through some shops together.  After dinner Mike and I took to the streets again trying to find a card reader for the camera and had a great time even though we didn't find one.  The buildngs were all lit up and people were everywhere - it felt like Times Square but not quite as crowded perhaps.  All in all it was a wonderful day.  I'm sure I will remember it as one of the funnest days of my life.

Beijing shopping street taken with my phone.