More Beijing (from Chengdu, China)

Beijing was busy, lots of fun and too short-lived. If you ever get a chance to go there, plan on at least 4 full days. We immediately got sucked into a world materialism and shiny things at the Silk Market and spent a small fortune. Totally unplanned and a huge expense, but it'll be better than Christmas when we go back to Canada and open those boxes! That night we had a traditional Peking duck dinner, which is a requirement when in Beijing. The restaurant was all cheesy and touristy, complete with a horse-sized, plastic, smiling duck, but that kind of thing is pretty fun sometimes and the meal was delicious.

The following day was full of walking and sight-seeing. We started off at the Forbidden City. It's huge, beautiful and ornate and made me realize I know next to nothing about Chinese history. Before going I thought I had a pretty good handle on things, but there's an overwhelming abundance of names, dates, dynasties, buildings, symbols, traditions, etc. that left me feeling very unknowledgeable. After the Forbidden City we went the next major sight in Beijing: Tienanmen Square. As the largest open square in the world, it's absolutely huge. Around 2000 people were killed when the tanks rolled through. Given the size of Tienanmen, it's some kind of twisted miracle that it wasn't a bigger number. It's hard not to walk around there feeling thoroughly creeped out and being there was yet another reminder of how fortunate I am to be Canadian.

That night we changed the pace and went to see the acrobats. They're complete freaks and no words can explain the ways they contort their bodies. They must have bones or muscles or maybe even entire body parts removed, who knows, but it was a great show. The night came to a hilarious end when returned to our room, which is right outside the elevator, and found my fluorescent striped underwear outside the door for all to see. Yah, we don't know.

March 3rd, 2007 was the highlight of my travels to date. It'll be difficult to surpass climbing the Great Wall of China! It was 7 degrees and rainy, but great for climbing a mountain. The steps leading up the wall are on no less than an 89 degree angle and a couple of feet high each. I was practically kneeing myself in the forehead trying to get up. Steph and I were leading the pack and feeling all confident and cocky in our hiking abilities until we realized there was a sprite little 72 year-old in front of us, thoroughly kicking our 24 and 25 year-old gym going asses. This old man and our twitchy little rabbit of a tour guide, who seemed to cover the full 10k with a hop, skip and a jump, made me and all of my time spent in a gym feel utterly useless. Parts of the trek were easy and overall we didn't feel too terrible, but some of the inclines and declines were incredibly steep and on flat-faced rock. This combined with rain culminated in a 4 foot slide and subsequent bail by yours truly.

It was a cold, wet and physically challenging 10K, but worth the effort 10 times over. Standing on 2000 years of history was an incredible feeling, but difficult to comprehend. It would set in for a minute here and there, but "I'm standing on the Great Wall of China!"is a hard statement to fully process. We returned to Beijing cold and soggy, but with a sense of amazement and a lot of excitement for the trekking to come in Tibet...should we ever make it there. We're now in Chengdu, the gateway city to Lhasa, Tibet. Only problem is that we once again discovered fully booked flights upon arrival. We'll be here for another week. Ooooooops.