After a good night's sleep we were up and out with our group to go sightseeing in Beijing. We went with 4 other families to see the Temple of Heaven. It was an overcast day, but there was often a breeze so the weather was quite comfortable. We have an awesome guide named Cindy who is from the Beijing area.
The temple of Heaven was beautiful, all the architecture is symbolic whether it is the material used (marble because it looks like the clouds in the sky) or the shapes, colors and number of tiles it all relates to how ancient Chinese saw the world. It is truly awe inspiring to imagine the workmanship that went into these vast structures.
We strolled through parks with trees up to 500 years old. Music was playing and many people were dancing along. Of course there were lots of vendors selling you their items, even though the Rolex watches were very reasonable, we chose to pass those up. :)
After the Temple of Heaven we went to a restaurant called Dai Jia Cun that had the servers dressed in the different costumes of the many minority ethnic groups of Chinese. We were treated to a lunch that represented those different cultures. There was a type of fried fish, chicken steamed in bamboo, mushroom soup, a pork and beef dish with vegetables. There was also a fried vegetable...don't know what type of vegetable...tasted potato/squash like. The last dish they brought out was a fried ball shape that they said was chicken. Rob was the brave one to cut into it and try it. He said it was like chicken meatballs...seemed too big to be just chicken "balls". :) Rob used his chopsticks like a pro, we both are a bit more adventuresome about trying new things on this time around.
After lunch we went to on a Hutong tour. We were treated to a rickshaw ride to an actual residence in a Hutong neighborhood. Hutongs are an older style family residence that has many separate rooms(but no bathroom) that surround an open courtyard.
The rickshaw took us back to where we could go see the Bell tower. We made sure to tip our driver as he got quite the workout hauling Rob and I around. :)
We might have lost a couple of those pounds by the time we got the top of the Bell Tower, it was 69 steep stairs straight to the top. Up there we witnessed the drummers going to town on these huge drums which would mark the time long ago because no one had a clock.
Our last stop was an acrobat show which quite simply was amazing. We had a full day of sightseeing from 9am to 6:30 so we were ready for a quick dinner at Pizza Hut and a stop off at the grocery store to get more bottled water.
Tomorrow we are up and out at 8:30 to go TianAnMen Square, the Forbidden city and the Great Wall.
On our trip is a little girl named Maya...she is 7 1/2 years old and was adopted from Hunan the month after our niece Allie was adopted. She thinks it is cool that we are going to Hunan to get Lydia, but she is going to Jiangxi to get her baby sister which is where Gabby is from. Seeing her has made us miss our gal Gabby even more, but we have been calling Gabby everyday and she is having a blast with her Nana.
Love to all and thanks for checking out our blog and sending us comments!
The temple of Heaven was beautiful, all the architecture is symbolic whether it is the material used (marble because it looks like the clouds in the sky) or the shapes, colors and number of tiles it all relates to how ancient Chinese saw the world. It is truly awe inspiring to imagine the workmanship that went into these vast structures.
We strolled through parks with trees up to 500 years old. Music was playing and many people were dancing along. Of course there were lots of vendors selling you their items, even though the Rolex watches were very reasonable, we chose to pass those up. :)
After the Temple of Heaven we went to a restaurant called Dai Jia Cun that had the servers dressed in the different costumes of the many minority ethnic groups of Chinese. We were treated to a lunch that represented those different cultures. There was a type of fried fish, chicken steamed in bamboo, mushroom soup, a pork and beef dish with vegetables. There was also a fried vegetable...don't know what type of vegetable...tasted potato/squash like. The last dish they brought out was a fried ball shape that they said was chicken. Rob was the brave one to cut into it and try it. He said it was like chicken meatballs...seemed too big to be just chicken "balls". :) Rob used his chopsticks like a pro, we both are a bit more adventuresome about trying new things on this time around.
After lunch we went to on a Hutong tour. We were treated to a rickshaw ride to an actual residence in a Hutong neighborhood. Hutongs are an older style family residence that has many separate rooms(but no bathroom) that surround an open courtyard.The rickshaw took us back to where we could go see the Bell tower. We made sure to tip our driver as he got quite the workout hauling Rob and I around. :)
We might have lost a couple of those pounds by the time we got the top of the Bell Tower, it was 69 steep stairs straight to the top. Up there we witnessed the drummers going to town on these huge drums which would mark the time long ago because no one had a clock.
Our last stop was an acrobat show which quite simply was amazing. We had a full day of sightseeing from 9am to 6:30 so we were ready for a quick dinner at Pizza Hut and a stop off at the grocery store to get more bottled water.
Tomorrow we are up and out at 8:30 to go TianAnMen Square, the Forbidden city and the Great Wall.
On our trip is a little girl named Maya...she is 7 1/2 years old and was adopted from Hunan the month after our niece Allie was adopted. She thinks it is cool that we are going to Hunan to get Lydia, but she is going to Jiangxi to get her baby sister which is where Gabby is from. Seeing her has made us miss our gal Gabby even more, but we have been calling Gabby everyday and she is having a blast with her Nana.
Love to all and thanks for checking out our blog and sending us comments!
Oh guys!! This so makes me miss China. We have to take Lindze one of the days so she can experience China for herself. Keep the updates coming.
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