First, Happy 70th Birthday Dad! We know there is a separate post about it but we wanted you to know we are thinking about you and miss you!
After waking at 3:15AM on Thursday (11/18), we landed in Beijing at 4:39PM local time which is roughly 2:39AM Central Time. We had great flight attendents. Even though we didn’t request a child’s meal for Nick, they made sure he had one. If he was sleeping during the time they were passing out meals they brought it when he woke up. It was a funny going through customs because they had 2 types of lines (Chinese National and Foreigners). Because there were so many going through as Foreigners, they moved some of us to Chinese National side to get us moving. We ended up in one of those lines. They guy even tried to make a joke when he couldn’t see Nick over the counter. By the time we got through customs, got our luggage and found our guide it was 6:00pm local time. Wow are things different here. I never heard so many horns honked in a 30 minute ride from the airport to the hotel. We got checked in and ventured to the local market to get drinks.
We experienced a lot fo firsts for our first day of the trip..
1) First Trip our of USA
2) First plane ride that had 3 meals
3) We met our first family who is in our travel group. We were on the same flight from DFW too! They leave in Allen.
4) First time ride in the BACK of the plane
5) First time to see people drive on the shoulder like it was a lane
6) First time to see 4 lanes turn into 1. Seriously, this isn’t like the lane ended or anything. They made their own lanes which merged into 1.
7) First to see a bank in the hotel
There are so many more but it has been a long day. We have an early morning. Go on tours…Tinamen Square, Forbidden City, and the Great Wall. There are 6 families in our group the entire time we are in China. There are a total of 13 families here in Beijing then we split up into our children’s provinces. We merge back together as a group in Guangzhou. We leave at 5:30AM local time for Nanchang on Sunday morning. We are scheduled to pick Danni up on Monday at 9:30AM.
We are calling it a night.