Apparently just after I took this photo the flight got rather bumpy. People started praying. Not complaining at all about sleeping through it. China is down there somewhere under those clouds. We’ve made it this far now after 3 great days in Shanghai. Terra Cotta warriers on the menu for tomorrow. The Cittadines tonight is far from roughing it and I’m not complaining. Testing this WordPress Android app to see how it works. If it looks good I’ll keep publishing.
Ciao 2010-2011. It’s not every weekend where you have to close down ski cabin again for the season. But it comes sooner or later whether you want it to or not. The last couple of years I’ve always looked at these closing weekends as a bit of sadness taped onto the end of an otherwise glorious 6 months. 6 months of the best friends and snow and mountains and great evenings spent around the fire and the hot tub and the table. But the snow won’t quit this year. We’ll ski tomorrow and we could keep skiing most of the summer if we wanted in California. So it’s not so sad this year. We’ll watch the mountains melt out to summer and the green to come back to the hills. We’ll become climbers or surfers or music festival goers and travel the world while the sun is high in the sky. When it’s time we’ll meet again for the Pleasure Point Ski/Surf festival and we’ll get ready to do it all again. See y’all next season!
With the exception of the few crazy hikers who have traveled it’s entire length no one can really say they’ve seen the Great Wall. But a few of us have been lucky enough to walk upon it for an afternoon or a morning. Just a wall really. Maybe 5 meters wide. Maybe 5 or 10 meters tall depending on the location. But when you turn your eyes along it searching for its end…well then something else happens. You follow its curves up and down till you find the next tower. And then the next. And then the next. And it keeps on going from there to the horizon. You open up your imagination and realize it just keeps going for 3000 miles. You’re a little closer to seeing the wall now. …Mr. Green mostly ignored my musings on this today. Instead he fancied himself a Dragon sent to defend the inner kingdom from hordes of shaggy pony riding Mongols. Grrr come on you Mongels this wall guarded by Green.
Alone for the day, except for my little green traveling friend, we set out to explore Yuanmingyuan together. Ancient site of the Emperor’s summer palace, and gardens, and lakes, and now a popular park for Beijng locals on Sunday. It’s huge. I spent five hours walking, and probably only glimpsed 5% of the place. It’s a world in itself of endless paths, hidden islands, ancient foundations, and a spot of sadness. It’s a bit bleak but British and French armies burnt the extended palace and gardens to the to the ground in a nasty spat of empire expansion gone bad. And though I haven’t verified this yet, Americans were probably involved in the poor behavior. Sadness over the ruins in hand we took stock and enjoyed the great weather for a walk and a bit of photo making. It turned windy enough that Mr. Green had trouble staying on his feet. He toughed it out even as the willows behind him bent and twisted like crazy.
Me and my traveling dinosaur buddy enjoy the start of another golden hazy day in Beijing. The view from the Wenjin looking south west over the city. On the one hand the smog hides every horizon I’ve seen. On the other hand it lends the morning and evening these end of the world glows that make for great photographic light. This morning we oughta dive into one of these little back street neighborhoods back there under the smog and see what we find…
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