Saturday....First Day in Beijing

We had a great first day in Beijing. The skies were perfectly clear and light blue and that apparently is not the norm here. No signs of pollution. We are feeling a bit sleepy and will be going to bed early, though. The day started off with a good breakfast in the hotel. Some typical things and some not typical. My favorite was the spring roll. It had apple pie filling in it. :). Anna tried congee and didn't like it. It was what she ate daily as an infant in China and we ordered it for her in China after we met her. 

After breakfast we ventured out to the area around the hotel. We went to a park across the street and walked around for a couple hours along the streets. 

After we (Barry LOL) napped for an hour, we took a cab to the Westin Hotel. A friend of a friend, Diane, was meeting us there.  It was an easy place for her to meet us that was between our hotel and her apartment. Diane is from the Chicago area and has lived here for 4 years because of her husband's job. While we waited for Diane, we heard piano music inside the hotel. We walked upstairs and some kids about Anna's age were playing piano and some sang. One at a time.  It seemed to be a recital or something. They were quite talented and didn't seem to mind the fact that we were watching. 

We met up with Diane and walked to a shopping area close by. It was interesting. We then took a cab to another area and walked around. It was by a Confucius Temple. We walked up and down the streets and it was really interesting watching all the people. The doors at some of the places were intricate. Anna enjoyed snapping pictures along the way of different animals and objects. The modes of transportation are always a hoot here, as well as the parking. We felt as if we were playing in the video game Frogger. Parking your car can pretty much be anywhere and anyhow you wish. We then had a delicious dinner at Hua's Restaurant. Diane was a huge help in ordering the food. We loved everything we got and of course it was way too much food. We had some rice, noodles, spicy pork that kind of looked like noodles, scallion pancake (yum), grilled green beans, King pao chicken, some type of steamed scallions with soy sauce, Diet Coke and Sprite. Barry had some Chinese beer called Yanjing and Diane had watermelon juice. Everything was scrumptious. 

As we left the restaurant we noticed the streets of Beijing were now packed. 

It was a great afternoon getting to see an area of the city we wouldn't have seen with a group and exploring out on our own. 

Enjoy some of the pics from my phone.