Beijing - Random Last Pictures

The last few pictures from our Beijing trip.  We had a great time, even with the haze.  Jenna was safe with her allergies, and we were very thankful for that.  Amazing sites.

Our hotel room.  Great hotel, great staff taking care of us.

The girls received free panda bears from the hotel staff.

Our guide Lucy was wonderful.

Our souvenir stash

One of our local lunches.

Addlea trying to make Anna eat squid.  NOT happening.

Our vehicle for the week.  A great big van.

One evening, we went to a play "The Legend of Kungfu".  Very interesting and very physical.

Site of Beijing

Beijing - Wangfujing Street & Food Street

During our stay in Beijing, we stayed in a Hilton Hotel just off Wangfujing Avenue close to downtown Beijing.  The Wangfujing area is the most popular commercial district in Beijing.  This area includes high end shopping and eating, as well as many tourists shops.  This creates a really interesting mix of the old and the modern.  The only church (a Catholic church) we saw in Beijing was in this area.

Food Street.  The pictures say enough.  And oh, the smell.  Believe it or not, we didn't try anything.

Believe it or not ... the scorpions are still alive on the stick!!!

Beijing - Summer Palace

Our last big event in Beijing was a visit to the Summer Palace.  The "new" Summer Palace is known as the best imperial garden in Beijing and boasts the famous scenic sites such as Kunming Lake, Shiqikong (Seventeen Arch) Bridge, Chang Lang (Long Corridor) and Changshou (Longevity) Hill.  The original Summer Palace was built in 1751, but was demolished by the foreign legions following the Boxer Rebillion.  The "new" Summer Palace was built in 1886 and covers about 290 acres.  This was one of our favorite sites in Beijing ... with the exception of the haze.  The worst haze of the week (by far), which made for many pictures to look black and white, cloudy, etc.  Additionally, we had the girls wear masks to ensure their asthma didn't flair up.

This section of the Summer Palace was built to look like Suzhou, China.  It's called Suzhou Street, and is built on a little water way.  Since the empress wasn't allowed out of the Palace by herself, she set this up to be her "shopping and dining" experience.  These shops would be run by the servants to make her feel like she was at the local mall.

I'm sure the shopping looked different way back then.

Cute little Chinese girl posing for pictures.

Emily here is blowing a sugar pig.  And yes, he was edible.