Approaching The Finish Line...and Beyond!: #2. Bumming Around Beijing (Day 1)

Note 1: I apologize for the delay in blog posting. I do intend to post every couple to few days. In China, the government puts blocks on a lot of internet traffic including facebook (how do those people make 'friends' anyway?!?) and my blog (damn blog-blockers!). So, I am a couple of days behind with posting.

Note 2: This post is about our travels in Beijing. Part of this blog is dedicated to someday giving Clare and Luke the chance to read about the (mis)adventures of their two dads in the days leading up to their births. If this interests you, read on! If not, head to the post called 'Birth Announcement' to catch up on the little nuggets.

Day 1: Food Saves the Day

Most people cringe at the thought of a 13.5 hour flight. We are kind of getting used to it! Our flight from Chicago to Beijing (we left ORD at 7:15 PM and arrived at PEK at 9:45 PM) was the shortest long flight (it might be the 2nd or 3rd longest I've actually ever taken) I've been on. I'm not sure why or how, but the flight went by quickly. If you're wondering how we passed the time, outside of the broken sleep we were able to accomplish, I took a couple of photos on the plane to help illustrate.

Me...from easy to medium to diaboloical on the Sudoku

Chris...enjoying his in-flight muppet movie

After two failed attempts at entering a cab (the first tried to scam us for 5x the amount of Yuan, the second didn't want to deal with two Americans carrying five bags), we arrived at our hotel in Beijing about 11 PM, so it was off to bed (again). We actually slept through most of the night which was impressive.

Despite a swollen and throbbing left foot (I have some arthritis in my left foot that randomly comes alive once a year and happened to decide to do so on our biggest day of walking in Beijing) we decided to get an early start. Sadly, our day got off to a familiar start.

Feeding an Addiction

Outside of my iced coffee addiction, McDonald's isn't a place I visit too often (Chris is an addict). However, I do like seeing the differences in the menu, and converting the prices. By the way, multiples of six come in handy in China. Every 6 Chinese Yuan is equal to 1 US dollar.

After the shameful beginning, we hobbled over to the highly efficient Beijing Subway system near our hotel

Hold on!

and set out for the Temple of Heaven Park, an enormous park with unique Ming-style architecture where Chinese emperors came to atone and hold ceremonies.

Chris atoning at the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests

The park has many more structures as well as a lot of people enjoying the open space. We saw badminton being played,

No net, but pulling out all the stops!

elderly folks practicing tai chi (looks like very slow aerobics movements) to Chinese-style music (sometimes alone to no music in the middle of an open area),

Loved watching these people...so happy to exercise

people randomly karate chopping trees (sorry, no pic of this one), and groups playing cards/dominoes/etc. that would put Chicago's chess pavilion to shame.

Some stacking cards game

All this was great to see, but the most exciting moment came when Chris and I sat down to rest my ailing foot. In all my years of travel, I have never experienced anyone excited to see me, as a tourist, in their country. However, as we sat and scanned our park map for the next place to limp to, people began to take notice of the two 'white' guys sitting on the sidewalk. First, they took pictures of us.

The paparazzi!

Then, they began to take pictures with us. More and more people began to catch on and join in.

Our fan club

Fifteen minutes later, we had to call the whole thing off and move on. They were all very nice and grateful (seems odd to say grateful for taking a photo), and we enjoyed the 'attention' and experience.

The day was designed to continue moving north to the next of several tourist destinations. My foot became more of an issue, so we took a taxi to Tiananmen Square. As we waited in line, we quickly realized the umbrellas we packed (which were still back at the hotel) for the Thai rainy season, weren't meant to be for rain alone.

If I had a yuan for every time I was prodded in the face by one of these things!

The Beijing summer heat (nearing 100 degrees, but luckily, on a mostly dry/humidity-free day) began to take its toll. After what seemed like forever, we finally made our way into the square. Funny enough, we ended up spending less time at T Square while waiting in line. I'm not sure if it was the heat of the day,

Good thing we bought that map you complained about carrying!

the cold feeling of Communism at the Square,

This place always brings up memories of NBC Nightly News from the late 80's

or (and truthfully it was for this reason, which was extremely frustrating) an ailing and swollen foot,

Nothing like level 9 pain at Tiananmen Square

we headed back to the hotel to recuperate and regroup. Here are a couple more photos of Tiananmen Square (taken on Day 2 when we resumed our Day 1 itinerary).

Tiananmen Square grounds

Gate of Heavenly Peace

Back at the hotel, we decided to suspend the rest of the day's sightseeing and do the one thing you still can do in these conditions...EAT! Luckily, there was a hot pot restaurant within stumbling distance. We had no idea what we were ordering or how to even order for a hot pot (the picture book menus and pointing helped out a lot), but I think we got the hang of it. Sort of.

Throw 'it in!

My spicy hotpot

Mmmm, mmmm good!

Chris enjoying something a little more benign

For dinner, we set out to find some traditional Peking duck. We consulted the Lonely Planet book and ordered a cab that took us to a large shopping area where we located the Peking roast duck restaurant on the 3rd floor of a mall, complete with ice skating rink on the lower level (picture Tonya Harding in her early Portland years).