Metro, Summer Palace, Acrobatics and more

Proof that we were on the Beijing metro (that's the best shot we could come up with, seriously!)
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Quick blog entry today, as the computers around here have not gotten any faster or more reliable since yesterday...

Today we decided to be adventurous and take the Beijing Subway. We were heading to the Summer Palace, and thought we could get at least part way there using the subway, and then take a taxi from there. As it turned out, we also took the light rail for a few stops, so we ended up using 3 modes of transportation to get to the Palace. Our observations of the subway system here:

we were the only white people (...) there

17-arch bridge in the fog
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• seems well organized, and fairly easy for english speaking foreigners to get oriented
• much cleaner than the subway in NYC (at least in our experience)
• not too-too crowded (to our surprise, since this was during rush hour)
• we were the only white people we saw the whole time there

The Summer Palace was pretty interesting, though it's a little hard to explore the whole thing (over 700 acres) in one day. Unfortunately, many parts are currently under renovation, but we got to see lots of greenery, beautiful buildings, a museum and lots and lots of tourists (many groups of children visiting). Chuck even got accosted by a youngster asking "Can.. I.. take a picture... with you". It was clear that he had only memorized this sentence (and memorized it very well), and only had a general idea of what it meant, but he was very happy when Chuck obliged. Unfortunately for the second day in the row the weather was very foggy, so not too many pictures actually came out. Also, our legs have started complaining a little bit about all the walking (and especially climbing). There was lots more stairs to climb up and down today...

Boat on the lake, with temples in the distance (in the fog)
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After we came back from the Summer Palace, and had a shower, we got on the bus with some of the other people from our group to go see an acrobatics show. It was pretty impressive, they pack in a lot of stuff into a 1-hour show. Too bad we didn't bring the camera with us (d'uh!).

After the acrobatics show, we went out for supper to a local restaurants with many people from our group. It was quite enjoyable, tasty and cheap (~7$ per person, including lots of beer, soft drinks and many different dishes).

Stone staircase (one of many, many)
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As you can see, we've  had a pretty full day. Time to retire for the night...

Later!