My China Birthday!

Our third day in China also happened to be my birthday :) ... and a nice birthday gift would have been the opportunity to sleep in, but our jam packed schedule didn't allow that! Instead, I found myself up at 6 a.m. and headed to the Temple of Heaven Park. Why so early? Well, we wanted to be sure and catch people doing taichi! Turns out, we got to see people doing all sorts of excercise in the park. 

These folks were playing with a Chinese version of a hacky sack which is basically weighted feathers...

...even Matt got in on the action. I promise, that is not an actual bird!

We saw a bit of line dancing

A bit of yoga?

A bit of group stretching...

...and finally, some taichi!

Check out a little live action from the park!

This little dragonfly caught our eye!

Eventually we made it to the main attraction at the park, the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests.

After we left the park, we headed back to the hotel. Matt rewarded my long walk to the park at 6 a.m. with a delicious birthday breakfast that kept us full until dinner time. Yum! After we ate, we made our way over to the Summer Palace.

Matt at the entrance to the Summer Palace. He's all ready to tour!

The Summer Palace is where the imperial court fled for breaks from the heat of the Forbidden City. Now I don't know about you, but when I think of a place to flee from heat, I imagine a place that is actually cold or at least cool.  Let's just say we weren't at all cold during our tour of the Summer Palace. In fact, we were down right hot! ;) I asked Matt why they didn't choose a much further off location, but he reminded me that the Summer Palace was built during a time where taxis and/or the subway weren't around to get you from the Forbidden City to the Summer Palace in less than an hour. I guess he has a point...

I imagine the royal family did not have to fan themselves to keep cool at the palace...but I'm not quite as special I guess!

So as we made our way through the palace, Matt decided we should head up to the top of Longevity Hill. Perhaps I should have paid closer attention to the name of our destination, but I was surprised by the effort I had to put forth toward getting up there. It was steps and steep ramps galore!

Faking a smile ;) Just kidding, it really wasn't too bad. We worked in several breaks to keep my heart rate down and to give baby Benjamin a rest :) To my great surprise (and to the surprise of many people at the top of the hill that noticed my pregnant belly), we eventually made it to the top!

Thankfully the view was worth it! Only it turns out...this wasn't even the top :( We climbed many more hills after this!

The imperial court had a small village built inside the palace where they went when they wanted to get a feel for what it was like to live as a commoner. We felt very at home inside this small village :)

After we left the Summer Palace, we decided to make a very long day even longer and track down a Thai restaurant that we read about in our travel guide. Well, a long subway ride where no one would give up their seat and a significant walk in the wrong direction did not make for a very cheerful me...but with a bit of complaining from yours truly (poor Matt!) we made it to the restaurant and indulged in some delicious Thai food.

Back at the hotel, showered and ready for sleep, a pleasant surprise came at 10 p.m. when the hotel dropped by a sweet treat for my birthday!

YUM! It was realllllly good. A whole cake! We didn't even eat half of it. Major props to the hotel because I totally thought Matt arranged for the cake to be delivered. He admitted that he couldn't take credit for it because it wasn't his doing. (I think he should have...I would have never known the difference, ha!) They must have noticed my birthday on my passport at check in.

What a delicious way to end a fabulous birthday!

Now time to rest up for our trip's most exciting adventure...the Great Wall of China!

Beijing by side-car? OK!

So you're in a huge city with millions of people and crazy traffic and you want to see as much as possible in a short amount of time. What do you do? Take a side-car tour!

See how awesome we looked?

Tours with Beijing Sideways are the top rated thing to do in Beijing according to Trip Advisor. Well, I'm not one to pass up a top rated activity on vacation so for our first morning in China we jumped on this motorcycle/side-car combo and explored the city at a crazy fast pace! Our driver, Dillon, was a bit of a...free spirit...and well, he certainly added to the experience! Overall he was a pretty skilled driver and we only felt near death 2-3 times throughout the whole morning ;)

Check me out in the super cool bicycle helmet Matt suggested I wear about 5 minutes into the ride. Safety first!

Straight away Dillon took us up to the top of a hotel just minutes from ours for a killer view of the city! I got the impression that we weren't actually supposed to be up there, but we were quickly informed that a dollar goes a long way in China in convincing someone to let you do something you're not supposed to.

See all of the red roofs in the distance? That was our first glimpse of the Forbidden City!

The CCTV Building, also known as the 'Big Underpants' to locals. Fun fact - I noticed this building featured in the opening scene of the new Karate Kid movie that I watched on the way home from Beijing - so that makes this building all the more cool in my opinion ;)

After a few stops for a gas leak, oil leak and over heating (not to mention the bike's muffler had fallen off prior to Dillon picking us up) - hey, I said it was an adventure - we were well on our way...

A quick sweep through a local market led us to...

...the most delicious dumplings I've ever had!

We checked out the National Grand Theatre, aka, 'the egg'...

...and stopped for a quick beverage break at the Zhonglou Bell Tower - originally built in 1272, then rebuilt in 1420, then rebuilt again in 1745.

Our short, 4 hour side-car quickly came to an end and Dillon kindly dropped us off at the back entrance of the Forbidden City...the next adventure for the day!

My first peek at the Forbidden City...I was ready to go inside!

The Forbidden City, named for being off-limits to commoners for 500 years, was built during the Ming dynasty from 1406 to 1420. The emperors of both the Ming and Qing dynasties ruled from inside there and only left when they absolutely had to.

The place is absolutely huge! We got through in about 3.5 hours which I'm sure is considered a fast pace!

The details on each and every building inside are amazing. It is said that up to a million people constructed the Forbidden City and after seeing it, I don't doubt that fact!

Since we entered through the back, we of course, exited through the front entrance...

...and directly across the street from the Forbidden City is Tiananmen Square, the world's largest public square.

A look back at the Forbidden City from Tiananmen Square.

After the side-car tour, a long walk through the Forbidden City and a stroll around Tiananmen Square, the only thing I had left in me to do was eat dinner. Lucky for us, Qianmen Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant was just down the road...which meant I was in for my first official try of authentic Peking Duck!

Like a couple of old folks, we made it to the restaurant by 4:28 p.m....

...so imagine our surprise when the line was out the door! #45 was our ticket in!

And here we have it, our own personal duck (we even got a duck I.D. card) being carved right at our table.

Nicely carved I'd say...

My duck wrap with all of the fixings...cucumber, sprouts, green onions and bean paste. You know what? I actually liked it! So it was either really good or I was just really hungry. I guess we won't know unless I go back someday ;)

And that ended our first full day in China! Exhausted and done, we made our way back to the hotel to rest up for the next day of touring the Temple of Heaven and Summer Palace...