Three Last Shots

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Our Last Meal in Asia

Our Signature Photo No Matter Where We Go In the World

The Temple of Heaven, Our Last Stop

This is was our last day in China. We really didn’t want to climb on a tour bus one more time, but we’re glad we did. The Temple of Heaven was built the same time as Forbidden City as a place of worship for the emperors. Today it is a great park where families and seniors come to play, exercise, and enjoy fellowship.

The best part was watching groups engaged in spirited card games, dominoes, Chinese version of chess. Others were exercising, dancing, playing musical instruments. It was great to see the children enjoying themselves.’’

Our favorite section is where the parents and grandparents come with pieces of paper that describe their eligible son or daughter. We dubbed this Matchmaker’s Corner. One enterprising family had a big poster; another had a photo album. The young people are too busy with careers to find dating partners and future spouses, so the parents are the matchmakers. No Match.com for this crowd.

The Great Wall…Truly a Wonder

Jim and I were both impressed with the Great Wall. On this sunny day, we made a brave attempt to climb to the top of the section we visited. We got about half way and the leg muscles were not happy the next day. This is definitely one of the Great Wonders of the World.

We also visited the Ming Tombs. This is a little like the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. The Ming Dynasty buried their emperors here for centuries. The day ended with a visit to a duck restaurant for a chance to sample Peking duck. We were all trying to figure out if the name had changed to “Beijing duck”, but no consensus could be reached.

Arrival in Beijing

We were ready to leave the ship and conclude our long adventure in Asia. The port is about two hours from the city. We found the weather unusually warm and bright on our first two days. Tiananmen Square was filled with families and sightseers, as was Forbidden City. We had to pinch ourselves when we looked out over the Square and saw Mao’s Tomb and the gate to the Forbidden City that carries his picture.

Mao's Tomb

Heroes Memorial

Our hotel, China World Shangri-La is gorgeous with beautifully decorated public spaces and large, comfortable sleeping rooms. The tour guide, “Charlie”, speaks perfect English and has been with us for three days.

A Great Hotel

View from Our Room
The unusual building is the state owned television network.

Lobby

Forbidden City

Blogging in the People’s Republic of China: No Way, No How!

The platform that I use, blogspot.com from Google, is blocked. This was the first evidence of government censorship that we’ve seen. With all the vestiges of capitalistic and western life here, this is still a communist government. We are sitting in Narita Airport, Tokyo and I am blogging the last days in China.

Korea and the DMZ

Jim was very excited with today’s adventure. We docked in Inchon, the site of General McArthur’s landing during the Korean War. It was a particularly foggy arrival. 

From there we traveled a little over an hour to the Demilitarized Zone, the 155 mile corridor which divides Korea east to west. It’s a bit spooky to be in an area that you’ve seen in the news all of your life. The barbed wire and manned fortifications are all too real.

After going through a military checkpoint, we went down into the Third Tunnel. There are four known tunnels dug by the North Koreans that extend into South Korea. The Third Tunnel is deep and wide enough to move a full division of troops and weapons in one hour. These tunnels were discovered in the 1960s and 1970s.  We were not allowed to take many pictures, but you can see from one we did get that the area around the tunnel site is mined. You don’t do any strolling or exploring.

We made a quick lunch stop in Seoul, enjoying traditional Korean food. Out of all the countries we have ever visited, I’ve never seen people who openly like Americans and the United States and appreciate our contribution to their freedom more than the South Koreans. It was a great stop.