Friday...

Exhilerating. Overwhelming. Awe-inspiring. Captivating. Amazing. Somehow, none of those words do the Great Wall justice. Standing at the bottom looking up was amazing. Riding the gondola to the top (yes, we "cheated", but we were on a time schedule!) was incredible. Except for Emily, who is terrified of heights. But she made it. Standing on the Great Wall, walking around on this massive structure that is 2200 years old, was almost totally overwhelming. At one point, I told Jim that it was hard to believe I was really here. I am not a seasoned world traveler by any means, but I've been to good number of countries in Europe and seen some of the great sights there: the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, the Louvre and the Mona Lisa, several chateaus, Michelangelo's David in Florence, and others. NOT ONE comes even remotely close to inspiring the awe and wonder the Great Wall did yesterday. It will go down forever as one of the most amazing things I have ever done. My only regret is that Brent and my parents aren't here to experience this with us....





After about 90 minutes exploring and climbing steps--lots of steps--on the Wall, we had more fun than anyone should be allowed to have at such a major monument: we rode toboggans down the hill! It was so much fun!! Some of us wanted to ride up again just to toboggan back down. Ryan was in heaven--riding on a little sled with Daddy, yelling "Go faster!" The memories are priceless, and I hope and pray for an opportunity to bring Ryan and Logan here in 5 or 6 years to experience it themselves, when they are old enough to remember.





Our group the last few days has been wonderful. 5 other families are touring Beijing with us, and all 6 of us are adopting special needs children. It's such fun to have "kindred spirits" with those you get to tour with. Plus, most of the families are like ours: older children, mostly grown, some gone, and going back to start over. All the other families are believers, and their faith is strong and evident. We are loving it! Truly a blessing from God. :)





After our excursion on the Wall, we stopped for lunch in a local restaurant. Off the beaten track, Angela (our guide) indicated that they don't see many tourists. That much was apparent! It felt like a circus side-show walking to our tables. Of course, 20 Americans, some of them very tall, eating in a local restaurant probably IS strange. How local? Well, they had to send a waiter to the grocery store next door to buy some forks for those in the group who don't use chopsticks! Now they are ready the next time they are invaded by groups of 20!





Our excellent lunch was followed by a 2 hour bus ride back into Beijing City center, where we waited a bit to watch the Peking Acrobats. Unbelievable! The show was amazing!! Everyone agreed that the "bending women" were disturbing but the rest of the show was out of this world. There were too many things to see and describe here....words don't exist to try and explain everything we saw! The only problem with the show is that it was sweltering in the theater. Oh, and the seat pitch was a bit short for Jim--his knees were in his chin most of the evening. Ryan found it a bit scary but managed to enjoy himself nonetheless.





Dinner was Peking duck last night, again at a restaurant that rarely sees tourists. Angela again had to send out for forks! She's got quite a supply now. :) Dinner was good, but most of us were so exhausted that we didn't enjoy it as much as we could have. Once we got back to the hotel, Ryan had a quick shower and just crashed. Tori finished her Language Arts essay and sent it off to her teacher; Emily and Hailey worked on a bit of homework and fell asleep. Even though we are tired, mornings come early here: I am usually awake between 2:30 and 3:30, and Ryan's raring to go by 5:30. It's caught up with him today--right now it's 11:15 in the morning and he's crashed out on the bed sound asleep. Good thing, too, since he needs to be in his best form for this afternoon when we meet Logan! Yep, about 3 more hours til we leave here to head to Philip Hayden Foundation and meet our boy.





I hope to be able to post again soon about meeting Logan, but I don't know what the evening will bring. Tomorrow morning we leave Beijing to fly to Zhengzhou, so there may not be any pictures/posts for a bit. Sorry about that!!












More Great Wall pics later...we need to eat lunch before we go get Logan, and uploading these takes forever...