First part of our September mini – adventure in the books. We drove up to Atlanta on Sunday, September the 6th with Aunt Meg. Stretched legs visiting a park in Megan and Jordan’s neighborhood (the group picture has a ‘hard-to-find’ aerobie caught in the top of the tree) and sat an outdoor cafe area of a bar, Midway. Froze yumminess.

Rawls helped uncle Jordan grill some delish burgers for the boys. We ordered a pretty tasty spread from the Iberian pig – assorted tapas.

The Georgia Aquarium

The following morning we woke up ready to visit the Georgia Aquarium – all of us first time visitors. There are a number of aqua worlds represented at the Georgia Aquarium: tropical life, ocean expanse, southern coastal. The tanks are massive and each area felt like immersion in a different water world.

After an early lunch/snack of pizza and mashed potatoes, which S proclaimed was THE BEST, we went on a behind the scenes tour of the tanks. Our favorites were the beauteous beluga whales (me), patterned whale sharks (William), playful penguins (Rawls), tank the turtle (S) and dolphin show. During the tour — we were able to see the Belugas up close during feeding and training time (along with a baby beluga born in May — they’re born dark gray and become white as they age).

Jumping on the road to Dahlonega, about an hour north now!

Time for one last summer escape before the “school year” begins! William’s music highlight of the year, for the past many years, is a musicians gathering in Clifftop, WV. As with all large gatherings of people this year, it was canceled, but a (much) smaller group decided to find a way to make some music happen in the mountains. David Strickland found a great spot in Maggie Valley, NC (near Waynesville) called Hawthorn Haven (http://hawthornhaven.com). The “haven” has two lodges, a cabin with two suites and chicken coops, a chapel and a lot of room to explore. We stayed in the bottom suite of the cabin and had a nice space for the family situated close to the main lodge where several musicians stayed (or camped in the outside yard area). 

The weather compared to Jacksonville was heavenly- from mid 60s to 80s, at the max. While much of the weekend revolved around music, we took the boys on a few hikes – some around the property, one up on the blue ridge mountain parkway (Richland balsam loop) and on a longer / 3mile hike (Purchase Knob) where we saw an incredible variety of mushrooms. The boys helped gather blackberries for a cobbler that we made (and shared) that evening!

We also had our first family horse adventure with John at Panther Creek — bit off the beaten path and not a place to go if you appreciate a lot of instructional help, but the horses were solid and extremely familiar with the route – the boys both loved. Shepherd rose Spirit and Rawls rode Cinnamon – the horses were brothers, a year apart and took great care of our boys, especially the initially reticent Rawls.  

At the end of the day, Rawls shares his thoughts:

Great area to explore – and perfect time of year to be in western NC. 

Homeschooling was never in our plans.. but as we looked at the school year and options for the family, we felt like this may be just the year to take control of plans and learn from a different perspective.

Our fall semester is going to focus on the Southwest of the U.S. — Most time in Arizona and New Mexico. Couple visits including Utah and Colorado with a touch of Texas/Oklahoma (passing through).

Here’s a start of what we’re thinking:

• Drive out through Atlanta (quick Meg + Jordan visit) and travel out through Oklahoma to our first stop: Flagstaff
• Week in Flagstaff
• Head the first weekend to Williams, AZ – close town to the Grand Canyon
• After a week in Williams and hopefully a number of visits to the Grand Canyon area, we’ll spend a couple nights on the rim at the Grand Canyon lodgs
• From there we’ll head to Sedona, AZ
• Followed by a week of true vacation/off the grid in Lake Powell and Zion National Park.
• From there – New Mexico for a month – Santa Fe and.. TBD

Annnd we’re on the long route home. Quick note to share that all is good here// we made it back to Beijing tonight after a relaxing first part of the day in Yangshuo.

We have a long breakfast planned for tomorrow and then head to the airport around 9am to head back state side. Learnings today – Chinese coach is a good bit tighter than US domestic coach and airport chairs can be over engineered to less comfy results.

Last full visit today and was a really nice one. Tomorrow we head back to Beijing and then fly home the following day! Don’t yet feel travel weary, but expect will feel good to get home.  We’re currently sitting on the teak porch of this beautiful room (truly a room for a family of 4- most of China does not get this concept- one child policy is a very real thing)

Waiting for our guide Michael to pick us up:

We first stopped at a local market. We thought this was the worlds largest cucumber, but it’s actually a wax gourd:

Rawls’ favorite- snails!

(Rawls and I skipped the meat section and glad to have missed out on the alternative local meat options available.. meow meow 🤢)

Admittedly I was questioning this family visit / tofu making stop, but turned out to be a lot of fun, esp for the kids. Shepherd offered to work for them for free plus pork dumplings.

Grinding the soy beans:

Cooking and straining the soy milk

After being the targets of photos all trip, the boys decided they wanted a photo with this little guy

We picked out our river fish for lunch

And then headed on a long walk along the river. The guide here, “Michael”, has been great

And we ended with a bamboo rafting experience / definitely touristy + very fun

Quick update today. We left Chengdu mid day today (low key am) and flew to our last stop Guilin, driving to Yangshuo. Not having acquainted myself with the geography of this last stop, I didn’t realize how close we were to Vietnam. This area is an autonomous region of China and is culturally much closer to Vietnam (local dialect is nearly fully intelligible and similar appearance to Vietnamese).

Our Flight

We drove to Yangshuo and a small town area for a fan making class. S loved the cows in the street and the painter  LOVED William – we’ll just leave that there  😉

And we are staying at an eco resort- the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat. It’s absolutely gorgeous and the setting is reminiscent of Halong bay.

Happy 2020!

We woke up to head to Chengdu this morning / another high speed rail, straightforward trip. Today was one of those days where we needed to take it easy and chill for more time than not, to recharge (the boys.. and maybe us too) for the rest of the trip. Highlights from chill (pamper) time 😉

First / yay for leaving THIS weather

They wanted to pose with S in the Chengdu train station.

They love nutcrackers as much as we (I) do:

Kids checkin 

After an awesome lunch at a low key local spot (more duck, shrimp and sweet potato noodles), we experienced a city “play area” contingent to a small market (they look like rubber chickens, but they are not!).

We then visited the local “people’s park” where we all had lotttts of fun with bubbles and other kids.

This was funny phenomenon to witness / modern day matchmaking / only for the parents, apparently they are courting other parents to meet and ultimately hope their kids are willing to meet:

These men gave shepherd sunflower seeds and asked for ppl to be kind to the Chinese ppl / esp Mr. Trump 😉

We are (not) roughing it – ha! (and yes, sometimes need some home comforts — after lots of unfamiliar foods eaten, this felt deserved.

Tomorrow it’s Panda Time!

Love to all!!
Us

Starting to write this and not sure if it’s going to be a quick one (bit tired) or longer (lots to share ;). Figured at this point you all might wonder if we didn’t have an evening update so here goes. We woke up very early to catch a 6:30 am high speed train to Xian. Great way to travel and easy to cover a lot of distance (300km/hr).

Getting off the train, we were heading in an elevator with a gentleman who appeared to be a conductor. Shepherd joyfully says “Hello”. And he isn’t quite sure how to respond, pats S’s head and says “you are beautiful”. We all got a few laughs out of that.

We visited a local mall for a quick lunch / new meaning to “make your own bowl” style place (mao tai)

Visited an interesting seafood market with massive crabs and sea worms:

We then visited the Tanbo art museum and practiced calligraphy. On our way out, Shepherd said he needed to “go tell the man something.”  He runs back out a minute later and we ask what he said.  He apparently told him “you really need to dust that piece of art” 

Then, the highlight of the trip so far/ a food tour of the Muslim night market!
We first walked down the main strip with our new tour guide, “Olivia.” 

And then met our guide for the night, Jessie. She was so great and runs the Xi’an lost plate food tour via tuktuk.

We started on little Leather road and the famous but teensy tiny bian bian noodle place. The noodles are named for this loud sound made when they are being prepared:

We then headed to Little study alley named for 1400 yrs as a local education hub. The boys tried plum juice (🤷‍♀️) but all loved the cumin grilled tenderloin. The place is only open four hours a day and only if fresh meat is available from the butcher. According to the boys “this is better than longhorn (phew!)”

Last two spots:

• Tomato and egg drop soup – very sour!
• Soup dumplings with beef, anise + cinnamon
• Congee with Nuts, sunflower seeds, lily flower root
• Sesame noodles (one plate with chile paste and the other without)

And a traditional Han restaurant – loved the grated carrot and ginger salad.