China: Day 3

**Beijing, China**

This was our second full day in Beijing and as it turned out we were the only family in our travel group in Beijing and using the CCAI guide...so we got all sorts of personal attention for these first few days.

One the docket today were tours of The Great Wall of China and lunch at the jade factory.

Normally it takes 1.5 hours to get to The Great Wall from our hotel but because of terrible traffic it took 3.5! Yikes! Something interesting we learned about Beijing and their congestion is that depending on what your license plate number ends in lets you know which days of the week you are allowed to drive your car. If you are caught driving your car (checked every few hours by cameras) you get a fine for every 3 hours they see you out driving. Steep, but it does cut down on the traffic that clogs the streets. One this day, and why there is so much traffic, is because it is a Saturday and that rule does not apply on the weekends.

Finally, almost there!

This is our view as we drive up...finally!

Our sweet guide Alice.

Obwald5 ready to climb.

A little history.

The sign below says something like, "If you climb this wall then you will be a hero."

This was the cutest thing. Of course this is a very special place in Chinese history. These lockets represent people that have come here for special reasons...for example getting engaged on The Great Wall. People bring a locket with their names and date engraved and then attach it here. Our guide told us of an adoptive family that visited The Great Wall but was not able to bring their new child because of sickness so they brought a locket and attached it with their child's name engraved on it. So sweet!

Wow, we are really tired by this point. I think this is the highest we climbed. We were currently getting yelled at by the policeman that we were clogging the doorway. We got a great photo though ;)

What an amazing adventure!

After our climb down and treating the kids to ice cream at the bottom I wanted to get some jumping photos. Our legs were jelly by this point but it was fun! There were so many people also visiting that we had to wait off and on for people to pass. As you can also imagine we had some stares...

...oh and another family photo op with random peeps. Shove those kids in, we don't mind. So funny!

And one more jump!

After our super hot and sticky climb, little treat and long bus ride we headed to the Jade Factory for a tour and lunch. We love the show How It's Made...this reminded me of that. There were two guys behind glass carving jade into their famous ball within a ball within a ball and so on.

For this portion we had a guide from the factory take us through at a quick clip. She kind of rushed but we slowed her a bit by lingering at things we were interested in.

Maybe she didn't think we would be that interested.

We homeschool, I always have something to add. ;)

One interesting fact about carving the jade balls is that the secret of carving them is passed down through families. That is only way you can be a jade ball carver. So cool!

 Here is an example of the ball inside the ball...carved all from THE OUTSIDE! Amazing!

What a mystery.

Some examples of jade sculptures. Did you know that jade comes in more colors than green?

That was news to me.

This is a fun tradition: when a woman gets married her mother or mother-in-law gets her a jade bangle bracelet. She never takes it off. They are very expensive because the piece needs to be very large to make the circle and without cracks.

Halls and halls of jade.

Look at this huge bull sculpture of jade.

Here is our lunch at the jade factory.

Once again they just kept bringing dishes. The large, long plate on top that is dark orange is a whole fish, including the head with eyes. The kids were a bit creeped out by it but most of us tried it. 

All of this food for just the 5 of us.

We invited our guide and driver to eat with us but they said it was not allowed. Bummer.

After we got back to our hotel we decided to venture to the pool. In most hotels we stayed in China swim caps were a requirement before jumping in. I can appreciate this considering I not longer swim at our local gym because of giant hairballs floating past me. It was a fun thing to do as a family and inspired some great synchronized swimming routines and a small selfie photo shoot ;)

Two sisters waiting to be three!

The pool was warmish and indoor.

  

Later that evening we pack up to leave Beijing. It was an amazing introduction to China's rich culture before meeting Aunna Hope.

I took one last look at this picture before heading to bed.

It's' funny as the days wound down at home to leave for China and these first few days in China I just couldn't allow myself to think about her and this whole life-changing event much or I would get no sleep. I was prepared to meet our new daughter. God has taken us so far in the last few years and we were ready...what good would mulling over how it would go or what it would all be like. I was just ready to do it! Gulp! Here we go...off to Zhengzhou in the morning.