Beijing - Summer Palace - flight to Xi'an

Today we got to sleep in, pick up time was 9AM.  Of course we could not sleep in, so we're off again for another early day start.  Luggage has to be packed as we are on the way to Xi-An later this afternoon by plane, our first of 3 domestic flights we will take on our tour of China to hit the major attractions.

 

Preparing Dumplings or Steamed buns for morning rush

Our first stop today was at a Pearl Factory.  Nearly bought a necklace, but I wasn't happy with the chain.  But, I do now own a Gucci watch, and Andre owns a Rolex, plus a present for Brian.  Outside every shopping stop so far there are all kids of people selling knock off stuff, both of our watches are broken at home, so we splurged on these watches.  Also found a whole bunch of chop sticks, these will make some souvenirs for friends. 

 

From the Pearl Factory we went to the Summer Palace.  This is where the Empress spent about 6 months of the year once it got hot here.  It was built for the Dragon Lady, if anyone wants to know anything about the Dragon Lady just ask, I will probably retain all the information for about 3 weeks at most.  There is a big lake in the centre of the property.  We were here for a couple of hours, but still didn't even get to touch on all that could have been seen.  It must be a very busy place in the summer, lots of boats tied up on shore that can be rented in the summer. 

Before and after pictures of the Summer Palace using Andres magic smog remover program

Street art, they come to the summer palace to practice their calligraphy with water, beautiful!

Covered Walkway connecting Summer Palace, over 14000 different pictures, amazing!

Entrance to Temple

Rocks are a big part of gardens in China

1st telephone in China was here

Andre at lunch, the Chinese were getting their pictures taken with her so Andre decided he needed one too.

We are now sitting at the airport waiting for our flight.  It is quite an undertaking getting 37 of us all checked in, but they have done this so often it is quite a breeze.  Going through security is something else.  Not only do you need to take your computer out of the bag, you also need to take out any cameras, Andre had fun.  He had to take out the 2 cameras from the bag, the lenses, and all his batteries.  Took a while to get all organized.  Also full body search for everyone with the wands.  Everyone is through and waiting at the gate now.  It is about a 2.5 hour flight, then over an hour at the other side until we get to our hotel.  We figure we won't be there until 11PM tonight.  Supper is on the plane, so that will be a change from our round table family style where everything is on plates in the middle on huge lazy Susan and you spin around until you find what you want. 

View from bedroom to bathroom, all of our hotels so far have had this glass window to the bathroom??

View from our room