Trip Report!! ABD Enchanted China 6/4-15/2017 Update 8/11/18! Day 10 - Shanghai à la Carte

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We did some walking around, and then had a quick bathroom/refreshment break. CG’s daughter managed to stack a pretty good number of water bottles while we relaxed in their small coffee shop.

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Joe showed us an area where we could see the “mortar” they used up close. It was made of, if I remember correctly, sticky rice, lime and egg whites! Pretty amazing to have lasted that long!

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A stately lion. We saw pairs of these lions all over china. We were shown that you can tell this one is the male because he has his paw on a globe (the world). The female has her paw playing with a cub.

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Our private tour of the Forbidden City.

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OK, it actually wasn’t a private tour of the Forbidden City, but it may as well have been. It was freakishly empty! Joe & Ralph were both flabbergasted. They told us it was normally wall-to-wall people, and they had no explanation for why it was so empty. It *was* the week that High School seniors took their exams to see if they can go to college or not, but neither of them thought that was enough to explain just how amazingly empty it was. *NOT* that we were complaining, mind you, but it was startling! I can tell you, we really loved it, and it made the experience just that much more enjoyable!

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Nine beasts. The Emperor’s rooms!

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The white pagoda in the background is in Beihai Park. Ralph told us the significance of it, but, alas, I’ve forgotten. Maybe CaliforniaGirl09 or Karen Stevan remember.

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Part of the gardens.

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I think this was like part of the Emperor’s concubines’ dormitories or something like that…

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The “Exit” to the Forbidden City

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The Moat.

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We headed out and waited for a while for our bus to show up to take us back to the Rosewood. Once we got back, it was the rest of the evening and dinner OYO. Some people made reservations for the Country Kitchen restaurant at the Rosewood, some went to check the Night Markets. I was pretty pooped and really not that hungry, so I went down to the little café in the lobby and had some Soup & Salad & some really delicious fries. It just hit the spot.

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I headed up to the room after that, and pretty much chilled & caught up on things, and took a photo of Evening Beijing.

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I then went to bed pretty early, knowing the next day was going to be amazing – The Great Wall of China!!

Up next: Day 5 – Beijing Great Wall Glory.
 
Loving the report so far! Is there anything you didn't pack that you wish you would have?
So glad you're enjoying it. Boy, I'm going to have to think about your question. I'm sure there was. But there was actually more that I *did* pack that I really needn't have.

OMG, this is such a brilliant tour report! Your photos are wonderful!
Aw, thanks!! I'm glad you like it! I enjoy both taking the photos and sharing them! :thumbsup2

Sayhello
 


Hi, really enjoying the trip report, fantastic photos and descriptions, if possible it's making me look forward to our Dis China ABD in October even more.
One question, can you remember roughly what time you finished lunch at Stanley Market, we are trying to see what time we have spare in the afternoon, as on our tour we are let loose
Thanks again
Ian&Diane
 
Hi, really enjoying the trip report, fantastic photos and descriptions, if possible it's making me look forward to our Dis China ABD in October even more.
One question, can you remember roughly what time you finished lunch at Stanley Market, we are trying to see what time we have spare in the afternoon, as on our tour we are let loose
Thanks again
Ian&Diane
Thanks! So glad you're enjoying it!
We didn't have lunch at Stanley Market. After Stanley Market, we headed to Victoria Peak on the other side of Hong Kong Island and spent a couple of hours up there, looking around & having lunch. We were done at Stanley Market some time after 10:30am, and I believe we finished lunch around 1:30pm.

Sayhello
 
Your memory is MUCH better than mine (or your notes, LOL), but I don't remember the significance of the little tower. Love reliving this wonderful trip through your photos. Such great memories. I'd totally forgotten about DD's water bottle tower. None of us thought she'd be able to do it, LOL.
 


Your memory is MUCH better than mine (or your notes, LOL), but I don't remember the significance of the little tower. Love reliving this wonderful trip through your photos. Such great memories. I'd totally forgotten about DD's water bottle tower. None of us thought she'd be able to do it, LOL.
:) I guess it's a combo of good memory and thousands of photos. :) I never, ever remember to take notes! It would make things easier, but I just never think to do it! And I was pretty impressed with DD's water bottle skill! :thumbsup2

Glad you're enjoying! It's fun for me, too, reliving the trip as I write it, and really looking at all my photos to narrow them down.

Sayhello
 
I'm so glad they added the Temple of Heaven. I really enjoyed seeing that especially with the Epcot connection. That's fascinating about the marriage market. I wonder how the parents decide who would make a good match.
 
I'm so glad they added the Temple of Heaven. I really enjoyed seeing that especially with the Epcot connection. That's fascinating about the marriage market. I wonder how the parents decide who would make a good match.
It was really cool. I'm glad it was included also. I meant to ask, though. Where is the 9 dragon screen in the Forbidden City? I don't remember seeing it, and realized long after we'd left that we hadn't seen it. Unless I was blind and everyone else did...

I have no idea with the marriage market how that works. I guess the "resume" is a conversation starter for the parents, and they decide amongst themselves? :)

Sayhello
 
It was really cool. I'm glad it was included also. I meant to ask, though. Where is the 9 dragon screen in the Forbidden City? I don't remember seeing it, and realized long after we'd left that we hadn't seen it. Unless I was blind and everyone else did...

I have no idea with the marriage market how that works. I guess the "resume" is a conversation starter for the parents, and they decide amongst themselves? :)

Sayhello


If you're in Tienamen looking at the Forbiddin City it's on the far right side probably 2/3 the way back. I'm surprised they didn't point that out. I do remember hearing from Jennae yrs ago that sometimes it's closed or not accessible for some reason. There's also another 9 Dragon Screen in a Beihei Park.
 
If you're in Tienamen looking at the Forbiddin City it's on the far right side probably 2/3 the way back. I'm surprised they didn't point that out. I do remember hearing from Jennae yrs ago that sometimes it's closed or not accessible for some reason. There's also another 9 Dragon Screen in a Beihei Park.
Maybe that was it, that it was closed. Ah, well. :) If that's the worst thing we missed... !

Sayhello
 
Day 5 – Beijing – Great Wall Glory

So I’m starting this day with an incident I totally forgot to mention, that happened on Day 4. I’d actually woken up at a reasonable time, and was not only on time, I was running a bit early! Which is pretty unheard of for me, and I should have suspected something would happen. I went through my usual routine, then went to plug in my flat iron for my hair when *Whammo*!! A *huge* spark flew out between the adaptor I’d already plugged in, and the plug for the flat iron. Then everything went out. The lights, the TV, the whole room went dead. Yep. At the very least, I’d blown a fuse. My hair (obviously) was not done, I didn’t have any makeup on yet. Yes, first world problems for a high-maintenance person! Plus, that spark had kind of freaked me out! So first I called Ralph to let him know what was going on, in case I was late (thank goodness I was running early!) Then I called the front desk and let them know what had happened, and they said someone would be right up.

I went back into the bathroom, and the adapter and the wall plug were pretty charred. Maintenance came up pretty quickly to check everything out, and flip the breaker back on (which happened to be in a locked cabinet in the dressing room/closet.) Then, the management type who came up with them tried to explain to me that my flat iron needed to be dual voltage to work in China, because they had 220 voltage there. I tried to explain to him that I knew that. That the flat iron *was* dual voltage, and that I’d used it in for at least 2 previous European vacations and had just used it in Hong Kong for 3 days. It took him a long time to believe me (I finally got out a magnifying glass and showed him the tiny lettering on the inside that showed that it worked in both 110 and 220v.) He pulled out a new adapter from one of the night stands, and then tried the flat iron in another plug in the main room. It worked just fine. Hair crisis averted! But I’ll tell you, once I started thinking about it, it was pretty scary! I don’t know if the wall plug was bad, or the adapter was bad, or if maybe I’d tried to plug the flat iron in upside-down or what. All I knew was, it didn’t work! Anyways, I managed to get myself together, grab some breakfast, and make it out for our trip to the Temple of Heaven with another story to add to my tales!

Anyways, onwards to Day 5! Today was one of the days I was really looking forward to: The Great Wall of China!!

ABD goes to a section of the Great Wall called Mutianyu. It’s a bit more remote & farther from Beijing, but that means it’s less crowded. And we seemed to still be in our freakishly un-busy tourist time in Beijing. (NOT that any of us were complaining!) So it really was remarkably uncrowded. That really added to the enjoyment!

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We were set free for a short period of time to shop the many vendors that lined the walkway leading up to the Wall. We were to meet at the end of the walkway at the appointed time. There were a lot of different vendors, selling a lot of touristy stuff. I saw CaliforniaGirl09 and her DD at a stand where a man was carving your name in both English and Chinese onto the bottom of a soft stone stamp. They were pretty cool, and had your Chinese Zodiac animal carved on the top. They’d bartered a pretty good price, so I decided to join in on the transaction, and get one for myself. But then the guy started to talk about us picking it up later in the day as it would take him a couple of hours to do. We’d been told we weren’t returning this way, so told him we couldn’t do that, and started to walk away. Suddenly, it would only take him 5 minutes. They really did turn out very cool!

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After we all met up, we headed up the hill to the gondolas. It was a *really* steep walkway! You can get a sense of the angle from this picture. (I actually took this picture because I thought this scooter cover was pretty darn cute. They were actually fairly common!)

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This was our first view of the Great Wall as we headed from the walkway up to the gondolas.

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After more of a workout than I’d expected, we got to the gondolas. I guess getting up there could have been a LOT worse without the gondolas!!

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The excitement was growing as we got peeks of the wall on our way up!

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We arrived at a small plaza, with a commemoration stone, and a chance to steel yourself before the last steep stairway up to the Wall. Ralph gave a short speech, told us where to stop once we got up there (for pics, of course!) and then set us loose!

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And then there we were! On the Great Wall of China!

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It took a while for it to sink in. I was at the Great Wall of China! It’s hard to really grasp how big it is until you start walking, and just see it unfold before you. The perspective changes as you walk and see just how far away the surrounding mountains actually are. It was amazing!

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Figures on the corners of the Guard towers.

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One of my favorite shots of the Great Wall of China!

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Some parts were really steep!

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There were also areas that had the opposite issue. They were long flights of stairs that were maybe an inch deep, if that. We called them the “invisible stairs”, and you had to be really careful walking down them!

We all were gathered together by Ralph & Joe for a bit of a talk (the mortar used on the wall was the same mixture of sticky rice, lime and egg whites used in the Forbidden City). After a fun photo op, we were given a timeframe to meet back at this location, and then set free to explore the Great Wall of China.

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Around each turn, and past each tower, the view changed. It was really a gorgeous area, with sweeping views of the countryside.

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The further out we got, our numbers did start to dwindle. I think there were 5 of us who decided to do “one more tower”. Karen Stevan & her son, one couple, and I. Karen & her son had hit that last tower & turned back, as I came up on that last tower.

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This is the point at which I tell folks that I went “one tower too far”. As I turned around to head back to the meeting point, I apparently never saw a short flight of 2 “invisible stairs”! They really lived up to our nickname. I felt myself falling, and there was NOTHING to grab onto (the battlements at this part were higher than my head). Someone, thankfully, a long time ago taught me that if you find yourself falling, just go with it, and roll. So that’s what I did. I ended up in a sitting position, with my legs out in front of me. The wife of the couple from our group came running back to help me. She apparently thought I was actually rolling down the wall, and was afraid I wouldn’t be able to get up! I took a few minutes to take stock, and fortunately found that I wasn’t badly injured. I’d scraped my right forearm near the elbow, and my left knee, but other than that, seemed OK. (Those were the contact points as I’d rolled). I had had visions flash through my head of having to be air-lifted off the Great Wall of China! It could have been so much worse. A few scrapes & bumps I could live with! (Although the scrape on my arm was a pretty serious scrape! It took two weeks to heal, and my biggest worry was that with all the airports & planes, that it might get infected. Luckily, with some helpful meds that Ralph had, and some large bandages, that totally didn’t happen, and it healed cleanly. It did scar, but now I have another interesting story to tell…)

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And yet, even despite my tumble, it was a fabulous, fabulous experience.

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The Guides pointed us to a side “shortcut” back to the plaza area, where we were to meet up. It was still pretty steep, but nothing compared to the way up.

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Next was lunch at a place called the Old Schoolhouse. It was nothing fancy, but it was pleasant and bright and the food, which we’d pre-ordered, was good. There’s not a lot of choice in this area it seems, but I thought it was just fine.

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On the way home, we had a “surprise”, where the motorcoach stopped and we ran up onto a bridge where we could see the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium, and get a photo of it, as well as family photos with it in the background. There was this crazy building there, also.

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The down side of this stop was that I really, really needed to pee, and thought we were almost to the hotel. But NO! We were running up stairs for pictures, and then still had some time until we were back to the hotel. I pleaded with Joe, and while folks were still up there getting photos, he ran me around the corner to a hotel that let me use their bathroom. Crisis averted!! It’s a long drive back; they really need a potty stop in there somewhere!

Once back at the hotel, I was able to secure a reservation for the Country Kitchen restaurant at the Rosewood. Several people (including CG) had eaten there the night before, and raved about it. It did not disappoint! I told the waitress I had no clue what to order, and she worked with me to figure out what sounded good to me. I had the hand-cut noodles with an eggplant sauce, and a side of okra. It was all delicious!!

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The only sad part was, it was way too much food for me to eat, but I knew I wasn’t going to have the opportunity to eat it the next day before leaving Beijing. It killed me to leave those leftovers behind! I can highly recommend this restaurant! Delicious food in a lovely setting!

After that, it was back to my room to pack, because the next day, we were heading to Chengdu after lunch, and had to have our bags out before we left for our morning activities in Beijing.

Next up: Day 6: Beijing Pedi-cabin’ the Hutong & on to Chengdu!
 
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So fun to relive these memories. I want to go back! Country kitchen was so good. DD teases us that if she goes to Beijing for a dig, she's going to eat there and send us taunting pictures lol. And I agree about the need to work a comfort stop in there on the way back from the wall--DD had to go so badly, too! She went with Ralph well we were all taking pictures to some secret location, which I guess you experience too! As always, fantastic pics!
 
So fun to relive these memories. I want to go back! Country kitchen was so good. DD teases us that if she goes to Beijing for a dig, she's going to eat there and send us taunting pictures lol. And I agree about the need to work a comfort stop in there on the way back from the wall--DD had to go so badly, too! She went with Ralph well we were all taking pictures to some secret location, which I guess you experience too! As always, fantastic pics!
Aw, thanks! :D Glad you're enjoying my Report and my pics! :) Be sure and share the taunting pics from Country Kitchen with me. We can suffer together! That's funny that I ran to Joe & DD ran to Ralph for a potty stop! I guess they knew we were serious about needing to pee!

Sayhello
 
Your trip report is bringing back great memories of our trip to China, just a few weeks after yours. It was such a surreal experience to actually be standing on the Great Wall. I had to pinch myself several times and remind myself to savor every moment of the experience. Glad you were okay after falling. That had to be scary! At least every time you see the scar on your arm you will be reminded of the Great Wall and your trip to China.
 
Your great wall pictures are amazing. I love all the different perspectives. I am sorry you fell, but intrigued by your rolling technique. It sounds like it avoided what could have been a bad injury. It's going to be a lot of years before I make it to China, so I am really enjoying visiting vicariously through your report.
 

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