Beijing - Day 1

Today we hit the ground running - well, really walking ... and walking and walking... By the end of the day, we logged about 6 miles. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's back up a bit and talk about my flight and arrival.

 

My total travel time was about 24 hours - the first leg of the trip was from Minneapolis to Seattle. I was happy to see that the flight was one with seat back screens with entertainment options. Those of you who know about my fascination with all things presidential will understand when I say that I was thrilled to discover a 7 part series on the Roosevelts - Teddy and FDR. I was able to watch 3 episodes on the Seattle leg of the trip, and planned to watch the remaining 4 episodes on the Beijing leg. Unfortunately, the last episode had some problems and while the video was ok, the audio was from the first episode. Bummer! So I'll probably have to look that up when I get back home to see if I can finish the series. The rest of my flight entertainment consisted of Big Hero 6, The Equalizer, and several TED Talks.

 

I was very excited to discover that the seat next to mine was empty. So I was in the 'A' seat and the 'B' seat was empty, then the aisle. So it wasn't enough space to fully lie down, but I was able to squeeze in and curl up to get a little bit of rest.

 

The flight itself was without incident - exactly the kind of flight you want. Passport control was easy, my luggage was delivered right away and I walked out and saw my driver waiting with my name. She got my to my hotel safely where I checked in and found a note waiting for me from my sister (Linda) letting me know where to find her and the rest of the group. I went looking for them at the restaurant only to discover that they had just left. I returned to the hotel and found both Linda and Les in the lobby - that's always the most exciting part of the trip for me, seeing the familiar face at the end of the trip.

 

Now to get back to that walking that I started with. Our first day started with a visit to Tiananmen Square. It was very large and the size along was really impressive. On holidays or special ceremony days, the square can hold 1 million people hand to hand! Unfortunately it was raining steadily so it was a bit uncomfortable. We moved on from the square to the Forbidden City which is huge! And since we were there and visiting, you may have already realized that it is no longer Forbidden. :)

 

The Forbidden City is where the Emperor lived with his entourage. The crowds were astonishing - people, people everywhere!! And don't get in the way of a large tour group - they do NOT stop... There were at least a half dozen times where I was literally being pushed from ALL sides as I was trying to go one way and the other tour group was going a different way.

 

Overall we spent about 2 hours between the square and the Forbidden City. As we were leaving the Forbidden City, we walked through the Emperor's Garden which was really beautiful - there were many trees that were over 200 years old and at least 1 that was over 500 years old! We went from there to lunch which was Chinese food! :) We were all seated at a large table with a lazy susan and they brought about a dozen plates of different entrees and we just kept spinning the food around and trying different things. It was lovely to sit, relax, eat and warm up - and dry off a little bit.

 

After lunch we visited a silk factory. It was really a sales pitch to buy silk, but they made it very interesting as well. they showed the whole process of making silk from the beginning to the end. Their best seller and what they spent the most time showing to us was their silk comforter. They let us help stretch some dried silk to help make the batting. The sales pitch worked on several of our group, so I can see why these places work with the tour groups. When everyone was done with their silken purchases we got back on the bus and headed to the Temple of Heaven. This is where the Emperor would visit to offer animal sacrifice and pray to Heaven for a good harvest. This ended up taking a couple of hours also. By this time we were all pretty exhausted, but we weren't done yet!

 

Our group decided to add an evening performance to our day. We went to a theater in the central business district to see a Chinese Acrobat show. It was supposed to be a "world class" performance - I wouldn't agree with that, but it was a good show and there were some really impressive acts. I'm glad I chose to go, but was happy when it was over because they played the music SO loud during the show I actually had to close my ears.

 

After the show, it was finally time to head back to the hotel. We decided to stay in for dinner because we had all had plenty of walking and activity throughout the day - a total of 6 miles as I mentioned at the beginning!