From China

Wed, June 24
 
Just got back from an awesome experience. Yesterday, after the Forbidden City, which was super cool, we took a 2 hour bus ride, then smaller bus to an entrance to the Great Wall.  We being me, Greg, Greg's best friend from middle school, and two of his friends. We got there in the night time, found a place to grab something to eat, and then hiked up the wall for 40 minutes or so and camped out. We spent the night right on the wall! We got up this morning at 6:00 ish and headed out for an 8 mile hike back towards Beijing on the wall. I have pictures. Many, many pictures. Parts were completely terrifying because the stone ground was broken and there wasn't any type of guard rail. Also have pictures of that.

Anyways, we made it to another entrance around 11 and got back to Greg's at 2:00. We immediately jumped in the indoor pool nearby due to the 100 degree weather. Yikes.


Tue, Jun 23  
Hi familia,

I'm in Chinaland! Everything is great so far. Our travel here went so incredibly smooth; both our planes got in early and there wasn't even a line at customs. We changed over in the Narita airport in Tokyo, which was super cool and trendy. Yesterday, on Monday, we went to see the Summer Palace, which was this huge vacation spot for the emperor. Its composed of more than 15 pagoda style buildings centered around a lake where you can rent paddle boats and motor boats to go around, which we did. It was so beautiful. 
 
On the way back, we stopped off at the Birds Nest and walked around that whole complex of olympic buildings. Today we're off to the Forbidden City and then the Great Wall afterwards.
 
Love,  Annie