Hiking up Xia Shan: Dec. 3, 2012

  Hi Everyone!! 

I am so happy to write and share our lives again. I can't tell ya'll what a journey it has been to get my blog figured out. One day not long after I posted the SaPa pictures, the blog posted that I had ran out of room and could not post anymore pictures. Phil and I have only one computer cord that we share between both computers so because this was his last month of school and needing it for work he has been on it constantly. And to top it off as of last week, that one cord died on us, so my computer is dead until further notice. haha.. Finding a 2008 Mac Book cord is pretty tricky here in Asia.
Hopefully we'll get one soon! Start praying people! jk. 

Today using Lindsay's computer, I finally found a way I can upload more pictures to the blog. Yay! However, still no cord for my computer so all my other pictures will have to wait but I am so thankful I found some great pictures off of Lind's computer.

Again, I am so excited to share. I feel as if so many things have pasted since I last posted. I hope to have ya'll all updated soon. So keep a look out for more post coming up. 

:)

Hiking Up Xia Shan! 

December 3, 2012

One day I got a call to ask if Monday dance class could change to Wednesday for the week, so excitingly Linds and I planned for another Adventure Hike! 

We had heard of this area from friends so we wanted to explore. Since it was a good ways away,
 we hoped in a taxi and had him drop us off the bottom of a mountain. 

Just being dropped off..
(Oh by the way! I've got bangs!) 

We hiked up the road for a bit. 

These posters are pretty.. haha

Oh the smell of those trees were amazing!!! mmm.. to smell trees again! 

Off the road we found a little trail and decided to give it a go...
Where could it lead? 

Graves?

What does this say?

I had too much fun taking pictures of the graves and trees.  

Our city just through the trees. 

I can't describe how big it really looks.  7 million people + and we live right in the middle. 

Up the Path..... 

Off the trail we wandered upon this little random gate. Being curious as we were, we walked up and I opened it just to peek through. It ended up being this beautiful garden and home. Oh how I could live there happily for the rest of my life. We both started to walk into it further until we heard a bark and quickly closed the gate. Before we knew it there were 4 big dogs barking at us from the other side of this wooden fence... Close Call huh! haha. We quickly walked away but soon passed an old man with a walking stick. We were tempted to stalk him until we passed the gate again but thought we might as well start hiking back to the road.. Will I ever find out whats further down the path?

The sign might as well say Beware of Dogs!! haha

As pretty as this picture looks, It was pretty disgusting. (Apparently, a bathroom area. Who knew?)

Our City and part of the Lake!  You can see barely see the mountains in the distance. 

 Aren't we a pair! haha

I'm looking under this bridge. It's this giant tunnel and it was actually really beautiful. 

We found another trail but we didn't have enough time to explore so I just ran up to see what was up there. 

More graves?

Everything was so nice we felt like we stepped out of Asia and both were back home in America.

Through this wall,  was a giant garden that you could pay to go in.
AND they actually had a real field of grass!
(I haven't seen once since I arrived.)
We also heard sprinklers which made our hearts leap for joy! 

This was a bus station you could take to get to the top of the mountain. Never have I see such a prettier place since I've got here. I have a hard time seeing places like then down the road finding poverty & run down things everywhere else. 

At this point we turned around and walked back down the road to the bottom where the taxi dropped us off. We had to walk aways until we found a bus stop. (NOTHING like the one seen above). It's much shadier at the bottom of the mountain and on the out skirts of the city. 

Dust was everywhere and life is more primitive. 

 Us on the ride home!! 

We'll we eventually found this bus. We had no idea where it was going but we thought we'd take it for a ride for a while until something looked familiar. We ended up passing the same road we took for the first hike. We got off and found a taxi to take us on home. 

It was a nice hike and adventure. 

Lily's 8th Birthday!

Dec. 1, 2012

My oldest nice, Lily just had her 8th birthday (December 2nd). I can't believe how big she has grown. The night before Lind's surprise her with a night on the town to a concert. So we dressed in our best and grabbed a taxi to the show. It was half fancy and half tacky.. haha. 

However, we ended having a lot of fun. 

Here's the theater. The women who played were actually Americans. 

Lily! 

The next night Lily had a fun sleep over with some friends. They made ordainments, painted finger and  toe nails, and watched movies all night. 

I think she had a great birthday! 

Hope to have more up soon!!.