Holiday in Japan

We are off to Japan on holiday for the next 10 days so blog posting may be sporadic. Couple days in Tokyo, couple days in Kyoto and the rest spent in the Japan Alps. It will be great to get some fresh air!

Party Time

Here are a few of our partygoers.

BDay Party

Ingrid's birthday party is today! Pictures to come.

Temple Of Heaven

We explored the beautiful Temple of Heaven in Beijing. The temple itself is impressive, but the real action is on the vast temple grounds where local Beijingers collect to enjoy the traffic-free public spaces. Beijing citizens are prepping for the country's 60th anniversary and it seemed the Temple of Heaven are the practice grounds. Or maybe it's like this everyday. But there was dancing, singing, games and even a marching band. It was a party, so much fun!











My favorite act was this crooner. He had a gaggle of Chinese women who were all swooning over his songs and his long locks. My favorite part is the end of this video....just as I think I'm filming the spectacle on display, it seems that I've become 'it'....

Taking Street Food to a New Level

Bye Bye Beijing

Ingrid loves the bar at Cathay Pacific's biz class lounge in the Beijing Airport.

Manchuria

Beijing has its charms but after a couple of days it becomes a bit of a grind so we headed for the hills, literally. We spent the weekend two hour’s drive north of the capital at an eco-tourist lodge in the mountains of Manchuria. The lodge is modeled on a royal hunting property and sits on 50 acres that actually were hunting grounds of Qing emperors. The setting was stunning, but the best part was access to the unrestored sections of the Great Wall that ringed the mountains around us. It was the perfect escape to balance nature with history!

The Great Wall is awe inspiring and Lizzie wasn’t going to let being 7 months pregnant get in the way of hiking over history, even though the trail was quite steep and very treacherous in certain parts. Thankfully the lodge assigned a young Tibetan kid named Lo Tzu to Sherpa Lizzie up the Wall which was extremely helpful since I was carrying my own 30 lb bag of rice named Ingrid on my left arm.

The lodge had lots of wildlife to keep Ingrid entertained. Horses, dogs, fish, frogs, cats, gnats, bugs and bats. There were also mosquitos and she is a magnet for them but we kept her slathered so she went unbitten. Stone statues of various animals and Buddhist deities were all about the ground and kept Ing wide eyed. Ingrid donned her Junior Ranger utility vest for much of the weekend so she was well equipped to collect specimens (rocks, flowers, bugs) and stash them in any of her many pockets.

When we weren’t hiking we were dining on hearty and rustic Manchurian fare like Mongolian Beef and Tibetan Yak. The Eight Notices was a favorite of mine, more for the menu write up than the actual dish, and washing it down with Harbin Beer after a long day’s hike had me feeling like a true warlord.

Man vs. Wild Wall -- 10 Easy Steps

‘All armies prefer high ground to low.' – Sun Tzu

While Lizzie and Ing took their afternoon nap I decided to conquer the big stretch of Ming Dynasty wall in the mountains above our lodge. There is a section of the original wall on the property dating back to 220 B.C. during the Warring States period but most of the Wall that is climb-able is from the Ming period from the 1400's to 1600's A.D. It is untouristed and unrestored so the condition is quite poor in most places though the watchtowers are still in decent shape. Looking out at watchtowers on the neighboring mountains gave me a very 'Lord of the Rings' feel as I wondered how long it would take the fire beacons to signal word of an invasion all the way back to the Forbidden City.

My hike took nearly 3 hours and ranged from easy strolling along rubble to really challenging sections where I had to climb near vertical sections of the wall like I would a ladder. My fitness level isn't great at the moment and I was hiking alone which is never a bright move. But I used my Flip to record video of parts of the hike with my panting narrative as the soundtrack. And for the record, Man vs. Wild is a favorite show of mine but at no time was I compelled to hydrate myself with my own urine or bivouac in the gutted carcass of a mountain sheep.

A Day In The Park

In preparation for London's Summer Olympics Ingrid spent some time learning Rythmic Gymnastics from the pros in Beijing.

Forbidden City

The Forbidden City is just a short walk down Dongcheng An Avenue from our hotel so we took Ingrid there for a birthday exploration. The FC is absolutely incredible to view with one's own eyes, let alone to walk through its immense maze of courtyards, halls, alleys. You think you're reaching the end and you pass thru a portal only to find a massive courtyard. I put it up there with the Pyramids as one of those places I've traveled/visited where I have that feeling of how small my existence is. It's one of those things you've seen so many times in textbooks, tv's or movies that when it blows your mind when you actually view it with your own eyes. Ingrid liked it but it was just another venue for her to pluck grass and pick up pebbles.