Wednesday,
November 18, 2009
SUMMER PALACE AND
TEMPLE OF HEAVEN
Today was a tour day. We began at the Summer Palace. Steve
made a mistake first off by taking some sort of cooked nut
from a street vendor and I thought we were going to
have to buy the whole bag. Luckily we got away without
having to make a purchase. Summer Palace was beautiful,
but we were told it's much prettier in the summer months
when everything
is in bloom. It was very cold there and the lake was
frozen solid with people ice-skating on it. The Palace
ground were much larger than I ever imagined it to be, our
guide said if we were to walk around the whole
lake it would take over four hours. I've included a
picture of us with the lake in the background. Also
another one of what they call the marble boat, made
completely of marble.
After Summer Palace she took us on to eat at a restaurant,
the food was very good, they kept bring us more and more,
even Steve couldn't finish it all. The next stop was the
Temple of Heaven which is a Temple people went to worship
for a good Harvest. On the outskirts of the Temple there
were groups of people playing poker, dancing and singing
Karaoke. We were told this is where the people hang out
when they are retired to meet up with friends. The Temple
of Heaven was beautiful, since we were so quick eating
lunch the place was very quiet with very few people in
sight. We even got a picture with us on the stairs with
the Temple in the background with no other people around,
which the guide says is a very rare thing. After that we
were dropped off at our hotel to get rest. She picked us
back up around 4:30 and we went to a show called Kung Fu.
It was a mixture of Kung fu and dancing that tells a story
about a young boy who becomes the Abbott (boys we
purchased the video for you guys to watch). I loved the
show and really enjoyed watching the young kids who were
about 7 or 8 do all kinds of flips. After dinner we were
off again to another restaurant with again more food than
we could eat. We also found out fortune cookies are an
American thing, no fortune cookies after meals in China,
our guide hadn't ever heard of such a thing. We'll were
off to more touring tomorrow..........
|
Us at the Summer Palace
The Marble boat at Summer Palace
The frozen lake at Summer Palace
The Temple of Heaven |
