The drive wasn’t too bad to the tomb, and the highways look very similar to what we have back home. We arrived outside the gate and had a great tour guide explain everything. So I will share the video here and pictures below Pictures Explaining the arch in the previous picture Lots of places to rest and enjoy Entrance to the tomb This is for the emporer when...
Read More
We were called the previous night our pickup would be 7AM in the lobby. So we woke at 6AM so I had time to check email and get some breakfast at the hotel. I was hoping for a somewhat ‘American’ version and it was close. Boiled eggs, cereal, toast and then the typical Chinese mix of veggies, rice, etc (I was really craving potatoes or pancakes). We met...
Read More
Since this is National Week, almost everything major is closed and so is ESEE. So we planned, even though others had warned us it would be crazy, to travel to Beijing. When else would we have a chance to see the Great Wall and other local sites. It was indeed going to be busy, since there were no 2nd class (ie. cheap) tickets left, so instead of 500RMB ($95CAD) each...
Read More
Even my laptop is reminding me how long we’ve been away!
Read More
Being the holiday, Kaelyn didn’t have to work and it was sunny so it seemed like the perfect day to visit The Bund and Yu Gardens. Plus Kaelyn wanted to look for some new shorts 😉 Videos at the bottom. We first zipped to H&M and found some shorts, and headed down via taxi to The Bund. We weren’t sure what to expect, and things were pretty normal in...
Read More
Kaatje had a busy weekend, working Saturday morning and a planned job out of town today. However, things did not go as planned. Because it is a holiday this week (Oct 1-7) everything is slow and busy. People from the cities go back home. So there was no train spaces left to go to Nanjing (this is the place we traveled via train the first week together) so she had to...
Read More
So we are very much more in tune with food now. We know where to go, what we like. We are eating more substantial meals too (and likely too many ‘eating out places’ than we should). But there are some pretty good deals to be had if you go to popular (ie. busy) locations. Here are 2 right across from my apartment: This is 9.5RMB ($1.75CAD) – 4 pork...
Read MoreDay 53 of 82 (35% of the trip is done).. more than 1/3rd!!!! The girls are working hard, and getting lots of jobs. But we miss home. We missed Hailey’s birthday which has never happened. So we are counting down the days until we get to see everyone.
Read More
So after leaving the Shanghai Tower, like the airport, there was a line of taxis ready to take people back. But afterwards when we got back, we realized we had been scammed financially. Our trip there cost 45RMB ($8.45CAD) but the way back was 150RMB ($28CAD). How did this happen, well looking back a few things were obvious and we won’t make that mistake...
Read More
Both girls finished early and so we decided to head across the Huangpu River to the second tallest building in the world, the Shanghai Tower We arrived directly across the street in a much different, less busy world than where we live. It feels more like Toronto here, wider roads, less people, tall buildings. And cleaner. There was many non-locals obviously here on...
Read More