Moments of Beijing

The rest of our time spent in Beijing was spent self-escorting ourselves around town.

Starting with McDee's every day.

Of course.

We went to the Temple of Heaven.

Admission to all the sights we attended was RIDICULOUSLY cheap. 

$8 tops. 

A stop by the stock exchange(of course).

Plenty of 

Ice cream

Donut

Hot chocolate stops.

The architecture museum.

Did I mention one day we walked 15 miles??

15 MILES!

We were dead tired and sore. 

Once we found out cabs were so cheap, we never walked more than a mile after that. 

Splurged and ate at our swanky hotel a few times.

 ^How pretty right?!

Had thee BEST sweet and sour soup our very last night at the hotel. 

Wish I would have discovered it sooner :(

Enjoyed the view at our hotel

Mesmerized watching the crazy traffic patterns.

Aaand the construction project going on across the street. 

Visited the World Park.

Tons of tiny replicas of famous world landmarks. 

A little ghetto, but we loved it :)

Amazed at how many of the landmarks Aar and I have already been to!

Fell in love with the Summer Palace.

Aka where the emperors stayed and played in the summer. 

 

Freezing our butts off right here^

Explored the Llama temple

Walked along trinket lined streets

Right after this photo was taken, a little Chinese family wanted a picture with Aaron... I was dying. 

It was such a blast taking in and watching another culture. 

Hope to see more of China soon!

Tiananmen Square

Our busy day with our tour guide continued and we headed to Tiananmen Square

The 

CENTER

of 

Beijing

It's a place of history.

A place of tradition.

New and old.

Emporers

Governments

Protestors

Roamed these pathways. 

Red.

Green.

Gold.

Repeat.

Those popular Chinese colors adorned the ceilings, windows and heavy beams. 

We learned about ancient traditions and ceremonies. 

How things were built. 

Aaaand took plenty of pictures and videos. 

We only got stopped once for pictures with my blond hair. 

Great Wall

...Aaaand we're back from China!

It was a crazy trip and definitely one for the books. 

We flew out the day before Thanksgiving early in the morning. 

I haven't done that before.



The Salt Lake airport lines were horrendous. 



They snaked back and forth. 


Weaving past stairs and escalators. 


Packed. 


But luckily they moved surprisingly fast. 


Because of our cheap flights... we had 3 legs to get to China. 

SLC>PASCO>SEATTLE>BEIJING



Since I travel a bunch for work, I have medallion status with Delta. 


We got upgraded to comfort on all flights.

And FIRST CLASS on one leg. 

^He calls the people in coach 'fiens'

Of course, it was the shortest leg... only 40 minutes :(


Buuut I was glad Aar could experience that, even for just a bit. 



The time difference to China was 14 hours. 

We got there at about 7 pm, which was perfect because we just went straight to bed. 



We zonked out right away.... 


And woke up first thing in the morning.


First stop: McDee's 

Sausage McMuffins, hash browns and diet coke(more like coke zero :( in Asia


After we jetted right on over the GREAT WALL


We hired a guide for that day, which might have been one of our best ideas. 

They picked us up right at our hotel in a fancy car and educated us on China and history.


Before we knew it, we were taking the chairlift up to the Great Wall

....to see views like this

 ....and this

 ....and this

 It was nothing short of amazing!

Obviously touristy parts of the wall have been rebuilt.

Other parts of the wall are just in ruins.

But just as cool.

This part of the wall was built in the 1300's & 1400's

Although the wall was built to keep out the Mongolians, it didn't succeed.

Aar and I were awestruck the whole time... we loved it!

It made the entire trip worth it, just for this!