We're in Beijing!

We made it to Beijing yesterday afternoon without incident. We even got to fly first class for the trip from Washington, DC to Beijing. That was sweet!

According to our guide, today is the day that is meant to wear us out, so we'll sleep and be adjusted to the time difference. So we did lots today. First stop was the Great Wall. It was pretty amazing! The section that we climbed was very steep. We only climbed to the first tower because of lack of time. My dad did great. I was a tad worried about him when we were coming down, but he didn't have any trouble.

The next stop was the cloisienne (sp?) factory and jade factory. We bought a little something at each. The craftsmanship in both of these places was incredible! The people that work in these factories are truly artists.

Next stop was lunch. We had, what else, Chinese food. We had sweet and sour chicken, dumplings, some bean egg roll wraps, rice, french fries (for the little girls in our group), and some kind of stuffed fish. The fish was not a big hit. Noone from our table tried it, but most of the other food was really good!

After lunch we did the Summer Palace. I have to say that this was a bit disappointing. Too many people! Since it was Saturday, the place was packed. We did have a nice boat ride on the lake, and I bought a couple of things from street vendors. A funny story about one of the street vendors. I bought a china tea set from her, and Roger handed her the exact change to pay for it (Alison, our guide, told us beforehand to NOT have the street vendors make change), and she started saying something in Chinese that indicated she was questioning whether the money was counterfeit. I just looked at her not knowing what to say, and then all of sudden she points to a tear in the bill, and indicates that she wants a different bill. Well, if Roger hadn't been with me, I probably wouldn't have thought too much about it, other than I didn't remember the bill being torn when he handed it to her. Anyway, Roger says to her "No, it's real. Now go away!" He realized that she was trying to trick us. The scam is for the street vendor to take the real money, pass it to another person behind her, and that person to hand back the counterfeit bill with a tear in it. So the unsuspecting customer would take the counterfeit bill, replace it with a real bill, and the street vendor walks away. Now the customer is left with a counterfeit bill.

After the Summer Palace, we went to the Pearl Market. This didn't thrill me too much, as I'm not a huge jewelry person. So not too much to say about it.

Then it was back to the hotel and meet up with Alison, our guide, in her room to pay for our in-China travel. That done, we took quick showers, and headed down to dinner.

I have to say that Alison was right. I'm ready for bed. I'll post photos tomorrow, since it's taking forever to get them uploaded!