Beijing

After visiting Shanghai for a couple of days we boarded the high speed train and headed for Beijing.  The train was great.  Kyle and I decided it was our new favorite way to travel with children.  Everyone is much more laid back, you can move around as much as you like and you don't have to worry about seat belts!  Actually flying in China is on a different level than flying in the states.  No less than 30 minutes before we START descending they require everyone to open window shades, put chairs in upright position and turn off all electronic devices.  Are you kidding me?  Three small children, one sleeping, one watching a movie and the third on the edge of a breakdown and you are going to require me to turn off the movie, wake up the sleeping child and get them all ready to get off your plane 30 minutes before we actually start the 20 minutes of decent?  Unreal.  So yeah, I prefer trains to planes in China.  However, in a country this large going by train everywhere can be a bit challenging unless you have lots of time.  They do have trains that go all over China, but only the large cities have high speed trains between them.  Kyle has friends at work who ride the train 72 hours to get home during the Chinese new year.  And they always take the hard sleepers.  They are cheap.  And crowded.  And hard.  You can travel even cheaper if you are willing to stand the whole time.  So there are different levels of train travel in China, however the high speed train was great, lots of room and super comfortable.  

 Shanghai Train Station

 Fountain at the hotel in Beijing, the girls loved playing in it.

 Beijing Hotel

It had a swimming pool, the girls were so excited to swim again.

 Tiananmen Square

 Forbidden City

 Tiananmen Square Monument.  This place is huge, far far bigger than the pictures show.  It is also still guarded by soldiers.  It was actually the first time since being in China that I have seen the soldiers.  It is still a forbidden topic here, the people do not want to talk about what happened and it is blocked from all internet searches.

 Huge screens next to the monument

 Government Buildings

 Two soldiers stand in glass boxes on either side of the Communist flag pole.  Then another soldier marches around the flag pole and the boxed soldiers, stopping every once in a while to make sure the soldiers in the box are positioned correctly.

 Chairman Mao's picture is still on the Forbidden City.  This was the home of the Emperor, it is the 'Chinese' castle.

 Secret police

 Gate Entrance.  The walls were insanely thick

 Another Gate.  The city is gate, courtyard, gate courtyard, gate courtyard over and over again, it is HUGE.

 This was under construction so we couldn't see inside but the main building in the middle of the picture is where the main throne was.

 Traditional Chinese clothing

 Snack break.  The kids weren't as fascinated with the palace as we were but they did pretty good.

 Small throne room.

Moat around the Forbidden City.  We just kind of wandered through but you can also take a guided tour or rent headphones that guide you through the City.  If we didn't have kids with us it would definitely have been worth taking a tour.  It is amazing how old this place is, it was opened in 1420 during the Ming Dynasty.

Visitor's From The Far West

Kyle's parents came to visit us in China in mid-April.  We showed them some of Huzhou, Shanghai and we also went to visit Beijing.  It was a lot of fun and I'm hoping that they had as much fun as we did.  I don't usually go into very many details in my posts because normally I just do a lot of pictures.  Kyle is constantly on me about being more descriptive and telling more stories but I usually just do not have the time.  Steve and Marsha were here for about two weeks and of course we had lots of adventures and crazy things that happened.  I could probably spend about two hours typing up all kinds of stories and then about another three hours uploading pictures, I think that between the 2 of us we must have taken at least 3,000 pictures!  :)  I don't have that much time so I'm going to mainly put up pictures.  But Gerber parents, if either of you want to type up some of the stories I will gladly put it on here, you guys could do a guest post, your take and observations on China.  

 The girls were so excited to see Grandma and Grandpa IN CHINA! 

 So was Kyle :)

 They had Grandpa building them sandcastles.  The girls think that this is their sandbox and the local stray cats think this is their litter box.  So you have to watch out for the 'special' sand.

 Kenz and Steve share a birthday so we celebrated with a cake, Kyle had to work late so we brought the party to him :)  and while we were there he took us on a tour of the plant.

It is a huge facility, this is only a tiny part of it, I am hoping to go back with my camera and take a bunch more pictures during the day.

People are always standing outside of McDonalds trying to sell pets, usually consisting of rabbits, mice and turtles.  The girls love it because they get to hold something and then torture me for days about how much then 'need' a rabbit.  The people love it because they get to flock around them and touch their hair and take their pictures.  It seems like a win win for everyone involved.  Except for me, I have to try to pry the girls away and then I have hear about how many different animals I'm going to have to buy them when we return to the states or Kenz turns 10, whichever happens first.

 In Shanghai we went to the top of the Financial Center which is the tallest building in Shanghai, the observation deck is on the 100th floor and is supposedly still the highest in the world, at least until the end of next year at which time the building beside it will be completed and is supposed to be even taller.  The elevator ride to the top was crazy, it was super fast and had all of our ears cracking like crazy.  The views were impressive.  The city goes on and on and on.

 Shanghai subway.

 We went back to Nanjing road for some shopping

 While we were there I told Kyle I saw Kaylie on an advertisement on the wall.  He believed me at first.  I was kidding of course but it really did look like her at first glance!

 We ended up in some back alley's where we found some of the really great deals! 

 These are the places that you can really negotiate for all that 'fake' stuff you want to buy! :)

These two guys 'helped' us find what we were looking for and got us some great bargains!

Beijing trip pictures will be up soon.