CHINA! A 10 day tour of China

Heather found an amazing groupon deal for a 10 day tour of China and we decided to go with her!  We left from Raleigh, flew to Boston, and then had the never-ending 13 hour flight to Beijing, the capital of China.  But we got there!

We arrived late, after dark, seriously jet-lagged, and without our luggage (for 3 days...) All we could do was collapse in our hotel rooms and sleep the night away.  Breakfast the next morning was an amazing surprise! "American" breakfast foods and traditional Chinese breakfast foods filled the dinning room. We tried everything we thought looked good.  Made a few mistakes (some sort of slick soft fish parts....) but overall our hotels had breakfasts that were plentiful and good.  This picture shows about 1/3 of the buffet that was available to us each morning at this hotel.

By 7:45 a.m., our tour group of 28 loaded onto our very nice, clean, and comfortable Chinese bus, waiting for us in front of our modern high-rise hotel.  Our tour guide was counting heads and herding us into the bus.

Traffic was as bad as we expected in a city of 22 million.

First stop was the infamous Tienanmen Square, the political center of Beijing.  One of the largest city squares in the world, it is 950 X 550 yards.There were lots of military guards and soldiers.  Camera monitors were everywhere in the entire city.

Adjacent to Tienanmen Square is the Forbidden City, the home of the last 24 emperors of China.  The emperors' families, his concubines (the last emperor had 3000 of them!), and staff lived in this "city" of 980 buildings from 1420 - 1912.  A portrait of Chairman Mao hangs over the entrance,  It is said that no matter how you look at the painting, his eyes will always be looking at you. 
The two girls in the foreground were with our group.  We saw very few Caucasians and actually were quite a curiosity for many of the locals.

This is the first of 3 courtyards in the Forbidden City, each as large.  A series of 9 gates allowed visitors further in the complex.

The last Queen Empress Dowager Cixi ruled China from here from 1861 to 1908, when she died at about 71.  She kept control by appointing child Emperors during her power reign. She is known as the Dragon Queen.  She also lived in the Summer Palace during the warm months.  This is one of the gates to her courtyard.

Her bedroom.

Finally our first Chinese lunch!  All meals are served at tables for 8 - 12, with a huge lazy-susan in the middle.  Countless bowls of wonderful fried foods, rice dishes, noodles, veggies, and such kept coming. Each table is given a bottle of  water (all Chinese tap water is not drinkable - everyone drinks bottled water), a liter of coke or sprite, and 2 or 3 liters of Chinese beer.  Think about the weakest, palest beer in the US - that is about what it is.  But we drank it!  If a table ran out of beer, someone at the table could buy another liter for the equivalent of $1.45.

After lunch we visited the site of the 2008 Olympics.  The tower with the Olympic symbol is tall and covered with cameras.  Each of the light posts has a video camera.

Here is the Birds Nest, site of many of the games.

Another day, another adventure - the Great Wall of China!  I think I was most excited to go there and actually see it.  It consists of a series of fortifications made of stone, brick, tamped earth, wood, and other materials.  It was built along an east-to-west line across the northern borders of China, approximately 13,000 miles long.  The earliest part was built in the 7th century BC with most of the wall built by 220-260 BC!!!

We climbed the steps to one of the first fortifications.  I do mean climbed!  These steps are STEEP and the step heights range randomly from a couple of inches to about 2 feet.  There were some areas that I climbed on all 4's.  We took several breaks in the climb!

Beijing has some of the tallest buildings in the world.  This tall one is taller than the Freedom Tower in NYC.

A short 1 hour flight took us from Beijing to Shanghai, an equally large city. First stop was the Temple of Heaven.  The Emperor was the only person allowed to enter the temple.  He visited here once a year to pray for good harvests.  He went again to give thanks.  Twice a year.  That's it.

A rickshaw ride was a treat!  Our tour group rode through the oldest section of Shanghai to a family home where we had lunch.  China is in the process of tearing down all individual houses and putting up enormous high-rises, at least in Shanghai, capable of housing 5000 each. This oldest section seems to have some sort of immunity right now but they continue to live without toilet facilities.  A neighborhood toilet is the only thing they have. These are slot toilets and toilet tissue is never provided - bring your own.

Lunch!  Bowls and bowls and bowls of food were prepared in an attached kitchen about 1/3 this size.

Beijing had relatively clear weather because they had a few days of rain right before we arrived.  Shanghai did not.  The smog got progressively worse as the week wore on.

From Shanghai we went to Suzhou, called the Oriental Venice because of the many canals. We took a ride along one of the canals to the Grand Canal.  These old canals are narrow and through the very oldest parts of town.

At the town of Wuxi, we visited the Grand Buddha.  He is 265 feet tall, one of the largest Buddhas in China. His statue is part of a large public park with fountains, walking paths, food stands, and several other Buddhas.

Buddha was born in Wuxi, so there is the Baby Buddha also.  He is in the middle a large pool, standing in a large lotus flower that opens amid dancing fountains.

Also in Wuxi is the Lake Lihu where we took yet another boat ride.

Both Chiang Kai-shek and Chairman Mao have mansions here.  They are on the opposite side of the lake.  The large pinkish building is Chiang Kai-shek's.  He was in power from 1911 - 1975.  His widow moved from here to NYC after his death in 1975.

Next night, Hangzhou, a "small city" of 5 million.  We arrived in the evening, in time to take a cab to a local market area.  Our tour guide gave instructions to the cab driver and gave us a paper to give a cabbie for our ride home.  Virtually no one speaks English, even the "Americanized" hotel staff. 
This was a fun time, looking at the small markets and food places.

Small shop, no room for a dressing room? No problem, just install a dress machine!  I stood on the little shoe marks and the machine took my picture, made a stab at my size, and put my head on a Barbie doll. It seemed to compensate for my heavy coat and purse stuffed around my waist. :-) I am sure I look JUST like this...Then we pressed buttons and watched me in all sorts of clothes!  A lot of fun, but not quite how I'd buy clothes.  Barbie Bobbie!

It took a lot of searching, but we each finally found things that we considered safe for dinner.  Our friend Wendy went out with us - her partner was coming down with a bad respiratory infection. Luke was struggling with one; he wore a mask because of his cough.

Wendy and I ended up with huge bowls of warm soupy veggies, chicken, and noodles.  Delicious!  Luke had a platter of some sort of chicken and lots of veggies plus a complimentary child's fruit drink.  Wendy and I each had a beer, which we paid for.  Our grand total?  Less than $6...

Our first tour in Hangzhou was to the West Lake, a beautiful park with boat rides.  Yes, another boat ride before some exploring,  This particular bridge is the Bridge of Youth - if you walk across it, you will become younger.

We tried!

The No. 1 Tea Plantation in West Lake was next.  This is the oldest tea plantation in China.  This may be fog rather than smog due to the altitude.

Tea bushes and white haired tourists. It was finally warm enough to go without our coats.

We did buy some tea, the Emperor's Tea, which is the first picking of the season of the Longjing tea, also called the Dragon Well tea.  The name comes from the belief that a dragon lives in the well that waters this particular ridge of the mountain.  This kind lady filled out canister by hand.

We did have several mandatory opportunities to "buy local". Jade, pearls, silk, embroidery, tea and Chinese herbals were all presented.  I have to say, a lot of our group bought a lot of stuff.  We got the tea and I bought a couple of small jade items.  Not the $12,000 necklace....

We were impressed with the embroidery, though.  These "pictures" are all small stitches of thread.  Here are an overall picture and an enlargement.

One of our other favorite side tours was the Shanghai by night boat ride.  The buildings were all lit up and many showing moving Christmas decorations.

Unfortunately, this video doesn't work, but you can see the lights on the buildings.

Here is the waterfront in the day. The tall building on the right is about 130 stories, about 30 more than our Freedom Tower in NYC. Virtually all the "modern" buildings in China were built after Chairman Mao's "Cultural Revolution" which ended in 1976 with Mao's death.

Our last day we went to Chinatown, (yes, they call it that) home of all of the trinkets, souvenirs, and peddlers than you can imagine!  It was fun. If you even exude a whiff of interest, the vendors latch on, and bid themselves way down from their opening price! We picked up a few souvenirs and I had a cuppa Starbucks.

We had a late evening flight which helped us sleep a bit on the now 14 hour flight back to Boston.  We both really enjoyed the trip and would suggest that anyone who is interested to go ahead and do it - via a tour group, though!

We are heading south! AMENDED....

Heather came to visit Maine – and escape the late August heat of  NC – so we did sightseeing, of course!  It all started as we brought her up to Rockland from the Portland airport.  We HAD to show her the biggest lobster in Maine!

 Rockport was on our agenda, where the old lime kilns stand at the harbor. In the late 1800's this little town was apparently a major supplier of lime for making cement. 

A biggie on the Maine bucket list was real lobster at a real lobster pound.  Here is where the lobsters come in, next to the McLoon lobster pound.

And HERE are two folks definitely enjoying their lobster rolls.  I’d say Luke is a little more enthusiastic about his!

The Marshall Light is always on the tourist list, located just outside of Port Clyde.  This is where Forest Gump ended his 2 year run in the movie.

A walk out on the break water to the Rockland Harbor lighthouse is always good.

The Penobscot Narrows Observatory was on Heather’s list, along with Ft. Knox.   Here is the observatory from the ground up…

And here is the view from the top down!  Yes, there is a very fast elevator! (about 450 ft in a minute)

Ft. Knox was interesting.  Built on the Penobscot in the 1850's across from Bucksport, the fort was to protect the good folk from potential raiders, like the Spanish. 

It never saw any action, and in fact, for a 48 year period had only 1 man stationed there.  It is an impressively large and elaborate fort! It has been nicely restored and is wonderful to explore.

Heather left, taking our car back south for us.  That was our same day to “turn around” and begin our journey south also, taking Latitudes back to the Chesapeake.  This isn’t a forced march, we have plans to enjoy the trip back as much as possible.  First was a stop in Long Island, ME, to catch up with Connie and Ged.  She made a wonderful dinner and the next day they took us exploring the Harpswell peninsula of Casco Bay.  This old bridge is an example of “cribstone” construction.  The the granite blocks are placed to leave large openings where tide and wind can go through the bridge.  This is the Bailey Island Cribstone Bridge, on the national register of historic places..

The Lands End Point is literally at the end of one of the peninsulas on the Casco.  Very beautiful.

There is also a nice statue there, a tribute to all of the fishermen and women in ME.  The model for the sculpture was a young man from the same small town as Connie and Geb.

Of course, the day couldn’t be complete without one last Maine lobster roll.

Next, to Biddleford Pools, a beautiful stop for the night.  We went ashore, walked to the beach from the pools, and relaxed.  This “resident” loon was fishing when we returned to the boat.  She has caught a fish that is almost too large to contend with and it is weighing her down into the water.  She is beautiful.

We left at almost daybreak and were treated to the sun rising in the morning haze as we neared the lighthouse.

Unlike many of the Maine lighthouses that have red or white lights, this one’s signal is green.

A stop at Portsmouth was next, mostly to see our friends that we met during our first cruise in Maine. We did fill up with water and diesel and had a diver check our propeller.  Latitudes seemed a bit sluggish and we wanted to see if there was rope or something caught in the prop.  The diver assured us that all is well below the surface, but there is in fact evidence that a rope was caught at some time and probably released itself when Luke put the boat into reverse.

Gail took me grocery shopping while Eric helped Luke “supervise” the dive operation.  We made dinner for the 4 of us that night at the yacht clubhouse kitchen.  It was great to see them again.

The channel into Portsmouth has two lighthouses –

New day, new anchorage.  The Isles of Shoals is a mere 7.7 miles out to sea from Portsmough and we love it.  The Isles are actually 9 very small islands.  At one time, this British colony was considered their most import colony in the States, due to the enormous amount of dried cod that they shipped back to England. They were huge schools (“shoals”) of cod.  Today the largest island, Star Island, is home to a hotel/convention center owned by a Universalist  and Unitarian group.  We picked up a mooring between Star Island and Smuttynose Island

Some of the residents from the 1700’s are buried here.  You can see a bit of the hotel also.

Beautiful stone homes were built.

This tiny church served the community.

It seems even more tiny from the inside!

Here are some of the grounds of the hotel, looking at the anchorage.

Trails are on the island.  This one passes an old Spanish cemetary, where sailors on a Spanish ship, the Conception, died in a shipwreck during a winter storm in 1813.

There are plenty of Black Backed seagulls here, too.  The last time we tried this trail it was too close to nesting time and the birds were quite agitated at our presence.  One of them repeatedly dive bombed Luke’s head as he held a stick high above it and made a hasty retreat.  This time the chicks are old enough to be on their own and the parents are elsewhere.

A new addition to the island is modern solar panels.  This 150 KW array supplies 60% of the islands needs in the summer, 100% in the winter.

We took the dinghy to Smuttynose, where a couple of the old homes still stand.  These homes are now used to house “stewards” of the island on a 1 week each basis.  The two teenage girls who were there now with their families helped us off off the dinghy and then to tie it up to a clothesline style rope pully to take it back out into the water.  The water here was almost 70 – we did NOT join the swimmers!

After Smuttynose, we took the dinghy further out to Appledore island to see the gardens of Celia Thaxton.  She lived on the island from childhood until death.  She loved her garden and in 1894 wrote An Island Garden, outlining her garden structure and life on the island. 

Back to Star for ice cream and another walk for Luke.  He found the art shed reflected in the pool of water.

Rockport MA was next.  It turned hot.  Really hot.  Suddenly instead of the 70's in Maine, we had a heat index of 106!  This is the actual first page I got on my weather app....

It did give me an accurate one afterwards!

We DO have sightseeing pictures that I will put in later, but they are on Luke’s phone and I haven’t downloaded them.  We did get these nice pictures of the two lighthouses,  The first, along with the moon, is the Straightsmouth Island Light.  Yes, we left early….

Rockport also has the distinction of having the Twin Lighthouses.

Provincetown on Cape Cod is always on our list.  It’s been 3 years since we were here, but we didn’t expect the growth!  We were surprised to see cars on the beach in front of the first lighthouse.

We were stunned to see the cars and people on the beach in front of the second lighthouse!

The fishing boat dock, where we land our dinghy, was dense with fishing boats.  Even the addition of extra dinghy docks didn’t help us – it was difficult to find a place to put it.

Town itself was busy, but then, it is almost Labor Day.  It was nice to see it again. We left early enough the next day to catch the lighthouse with only birds.

We had to time our departure from Provincetown to go through the Cape Cod canal at the right tide.  The current here peaks at almost 3 ½ knots and that is a lot of try to sail against.  But the big barges can do it!  We met this absolutely huge barge coming towards us.  Yes, the picture is not good, and that’s because it’s taken through our enclosure screening.  Flies were horrible.  They came in droves and were interested in our ankles and most other exposed body parts.  We learned the hard way in the Chesapeake about the importance of having screens and were ready to put them up.

 Here is one of the pretty bridges on the canal - shot before the flies got too bad.

Today we are in Onset, just at the western end of the Cape Cod Canal.  Pizza, laundry, and internet filled today.  Smokey always helps with laundry...

 Tomorrow we plan to leave for Block Harbor, weather permitting.

AND - 4 MONTHS LATER ----

It was crazy and we had little internet.  When we got home, it was even crazier with a trip to CO to see the grandkids, guests, the trip to  China, and then there was Christmas with all of the guests, parties, and fun.  And then New Years...  BUT to finish the story without pictures ----


We left Onset for a bumpy ride to Block Island.  It was fun to be there again.  From there, we headed down the coast to Atlantic City. Our initial goal was Cape May, but a long day and impending storms stopped us in Atlantic City.  After a few stormy days there, we were faced with the decision of where to ride out Hurricane Florence.  Atlantic City wasn't an option, as the anchorage is too open to the ocean.  So, at the gracious invitation of two wonderful boating friends, we turned back north and spend one entire dense fog-ridden day going to Barnagat Bay NJ. We made it soooo far but by the time we were safely in the waters behind the barrier islands, the fog closed so tightly that we could not see our way, even with the help of our GPS and chart plotter.  With info from our friends, we called the Coast Guard Auxiliary.  They found us and guided us all the way to our destination (the guardsman is a good friend/neighbor our our buddies).  Safe at last for almost a week!
Back into the Atlantic, we sailed uneventfully back down the coast with stops in Cape May, a scoot up the Delaware Bay, a couple of stops for bad weather in the Chesapeake, and finally after a long stormy day ended up in Reidsville, VA for the night.  Boating friends Wendy and Warwick keep their boat there and had recommended a marina.  Just the idea of another long day on the Chesapeake was enough to convince us to check into the option.  It was a good option, less expensive than Deltaville, convenient to the Bay, and WE WERE ALREADY THERE!  Out of the water we went, prepared the boat for the winter, had Heather pick us up with our car, and ended up back home by the end of  September.  ahhhhh.....  so much for boating until next spring, when we'll put Latitudes back in the water and re-explore the Chesapeake Bay.  Our boat excursions will be days or weeks, not months.  It will be a nice change to have more time at home but with Latitudes available whenever we want to use her.