DAY TWO OF TOURING

We had a FULL day today and I am totally zonked!!! I am going to try to share as much as possible, though. In less than 48 hours the IMPORTANT entries will begin!!!! I

The tiny red building at the top.....that was our goal to climb to. 
You can only imagine having to climb up that.

This picture with the four brick high step is just an example 
of how tall some of the steps were on our climb. 

We set our goal on making it to that top point, and we did......all SEVEN HUNDRED FORTY-TWO STEPS!!! Yes.....742 steps. AND, of course, since we went UP 742 steps, we had to come DOWN 742 steps!!! The last time we climbed the Great Wall, we had to hold our girls' hands all the way up and all the way down. Today they were very independent and climbed on their own. It was quite an accomplishment for them, especially for Callie Beth who has a vision and depth perception problem. I hope her vision teacher, OT, and PT at school see this!!!! 

This is a picture of the brick walk with Callie Beth. 
It shows in the background how steep it was in spots going back down.

There is so much history and interesting facts connected to the Great Wall. Our guide told us today that when it was being built, 9 out of 10 of the laborers died while working on the wall,, and when someone would die, their body would simply be buried in the wall. The Great Wall of China is also often known as the Great Cemetery of China. 

After we left our Great Wall adventure, we visited a government owned Jade Factory, and had lunch in the restaurant there. Yep.....you guessed it. We had Chinese food. It was actually really good. The food here is NOTHING like the food at our local Chinese restaurants around home. It is much healthier, and there is a great variety of food. Despite the fact that we are already tired of Chinese cuisine, we enjoyed it. Poor Molly Kate won't try anything new, but she has eaten her weigh in rice these past two days. 

We went on a short tour at the jade factory. I bought a jade bangle bracelet for Ansley Grace, as well as a jade figure of her Chinese zodiac animal, the rat. After our tour, we started back to the hotel, which was about and hour and a half drive. We drove by what is called the Cube and the Bird's Nest which were both constructed in Beijing for the 2008 Olympics held here.

After reaching the hotel, we had about 15 minutes before we had to reload the bus to go to the Chinese Acrobat Show. This was the third time we had attended it, but every time the acts have been different, and it was as amazing as ever tonight.

Instead of going back to the hotel after the show, we opted to have the bus driver drop us off at the "Food Court." Our purpose for going there was NOT to eat......we actually would probably would have gotten deathly sick had we eaten anything from there. It is just amazing to see. Vendor after vendor with some very UNUSUAL foods for sale......fried scorpion and snake, fried sheep testicles and penises, intestines of who knows what kind of animal......the list goes on. There were probably 100-200 different foods being sold there, and doubt that any of them would be found in our local Kroger. Molly Kate informed us that it smelled REALLY bad, and she was right. It was also shoulder to shoulder with people walking and eating all the disgusting foods!!!

On our walk back to the hotel we decided we probably needed to find somewhere to eat supper, since it had been quite a long time since lunch. The fact that we chose McDonald's might give you an idea of just HOW tired we already are of the typical menu here. And also, considering that the food at McDonald's here isn't really quite the same flavor of the food at McDonald's at home.......well, I guess we were just hungry. :)

We made it back to our hotel room, I got the girls hair washed and we got several pages of math assignments completed. Roger and the girls have all three conked out on me. I have to get everything packed tonight and have our suitcases ready by 7:30 in the morning to be taken to our bus. We will be traveling to the train station to take the Bullet Train to Zhengzhou, Henan. I have a feeling the train station is going to be an experience of a lifetime in itself as we try to get four large suitcases, two carry-ons, and four backpacks up an escalator and to the right location in a timely manner. It may make for an interesting blog entry tomorrow night!!! Our phenomenal guide, Jason will be with us, though, as well as at least 4 or 5 other families in our travel group. I'm sure it will be fine.

Our countdown has really begun. In less than 48 hours, we will be united with our precious daughter number FOUR!!! Please continue to pray for her and for us, too, that the transition will be smooth and that she will know and recognize from the beginning that we already love her to pieces. :)