Some of the Smartours group exiting buses at the Shanghai Airport
This was a perfectly flat drawing on the floor of the terminal that looks 3 dimensional from afar
Inside the terminal
Sarah, Maria and Connie after checking inWe're here! We traveled a lot yesterday (to say the least). Our "non-stop" flight from Shanghai to S.F. somehow included a flight to Beijing with a 1.5 hour layover. Apparently, all China Air flights internationally have to arrive and depart from Shanghai. This fact was never conveyed to us by Smartours and caused a little consternation. There was a gap of 4 or 5 hours in our flight times on our original itinerary that was explained by the flight to Beijing.
I thought the flight was pretty easy and we were able to sleep (fitfully) on the 10.5 hour flight from Beijing to S.F. We arrived on Sunday at about 11:00 in the morning and headed for our hotel. We pretty much hit the road running - got some lunch and went out for a cable car ride all around S.F. Hit the bed around 9:00 at night with plans to sleep in as much a we could before heading out today to see Muir Woods National Park. This is about 10 miles north of S.F. and is the closest place to see Redwood trees. We will then return for our evening tour of Alcatraz Island at 4:40 this evening. Sleep and a 2:00 flight on Tuesday brings us home.
The Internet was an interesting experience in China. Access to sites like this one are routinely blocked by the Chinese authorities. When you try to access Facebook or blog spots you receive a message that the internet is unavailable. Ben showed me a way to get around this and I did the best I could when I had internet access. Basically you have to access the internet from a site outside of China. Ben had a VPN (technical stuff) that his uncle Bob uses that has an address in Japan. Once you access the internet from that site you are able to get to the blogspots. We tend to take our personal freedoms without too much thought about them. This opens your eyes to the concept of censorship. I would have liked to have posted much more and will do some more retroactively if anyone is interested.
The airports are pretty amazing in China and I'll post a few quick images here now.
I thought the flight was pretty easy and we were able to sleep (fitfully) on the 10.5 hour flight from Beijing to S.F. We arrived on Sunday at about 11:00 in the morning and headed for our hotel. We pretty much hit the road running - got some lunch and went out for a cable car ride all around S.F. Hit the bed around 9:00 at night with plans to sleep in as much a we could before heading out today to see Muir Woods National Park. This is about 10 miles north of S.F. and is the closest place to see Redwood trees. We will then return for our evening tour of Alcatraz Island at 4:40 this evening. Sleep and a 2:00 flight on Tuesday brings us home.
The Internet was an interesting experience in China. Access to sites like this one are routinely blocked by the Chinese authorities. When you try to access Facebook or blog spots you receive a message that the internet is unavailable. Ben showed me a way to get around this and I did the best I could when I had internet access. Basically you have to access the internet from a site outside of China. Ben had a VPN (technical stuff) that his uncle Bob uses that has an address in Japan. Once you access the internet from that site you are able to get to the blogspots. We tend to take our personal freedoms without too much thought about them. This opens your eyes to the concept of censorship. I would have liked to have posted much more and will do some more retroactively if anyone is interested.
The airports are pretty amazing in China and I'll post a few quick images here now.
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