Great Wall of China

Katie says she is sure I am posting what she says, putting the pictures where they go, and labeling them. I am good at all except that last bit, but will caption any pictures that seem ambiguous :) She also reports the pictures are smaller, so hopefully that will help with the viewing. I remain your Blogmaster, Kris


For our last day in Beijing, we were busy!! After breakfast, we went to a jade factory and then to climb the Great Wall. We were extremely bundled up as you can see, but we shed some layers with the exercise we were getting from climbing all the uneven stairs. We didn’t know how far Jonah could make it, but as Cheryl put it, he is an animal!! He just kept climbing and climbing (usually with his hands and his feet). He would say, this is hard to climb, but big kids can do it and I can get to the top. He is one tenacious little climber!! He was able to climb a lot more easily than the adults, and he did get almost to the very top before collapsing with exhaustion. He also loved it.

After that, the poor little thing was exhausted. We went and got lunch and then had a 30 minute walk through the Ming tombs. It turned out to be a nice little walk in the park, and Jonah had a good time with a little boy named Andrew who is with the group and here to get a little sister.

However, after that, Jonah was so tired….he just wanted to get off the bus, eat, and sleep all at the same time!! We drove by the Olympic complex and saw the buildings which look cool even though they’re still under construction. It is pretty interesting to be here when they are getting ready for the Olympics. Everything is being fixed up and redone….even the metro smells new. (They’re building new lines).

However, when we got back, we had to take Jonah to Starbucks for hot chocolate (he needed milk), muffin and a sandwich. He was so tired he had a huge temper tantrum all the way back to the hotel, and then practically fell asleep on me while trying to eat at the same time. Missing a nap after climbing a large amount of steep, uneven stairs is possibly not exactly the best idea! Thank goodness Cheryl is here and can help with him so we don’t have to miss more naps due to adoption appointments or anything!

Tomorrow morning we leave for Lanzhou, Gansu province, the capitol city of the province where Grady Guoyu is and we get him on Monday….yay!!!