October 2-3, 2005

October 2-3, 2005

Today we left for the Orient, first flying to San Francisco and from there catching a non-stop flight to Beijing, the capital and second largest city in the People’s Republic of China. Our guide from China Focus Travel met us at baggage claim. She was a cute Chinese girl speaking very good English. After introducing us to our mini-van driver, we all drove to our hotel (Beijing Henan Plaza Hotel), and checked in for the evening hoping to recover quickly from our jetlag.

With us in the tour group are six others: four Vietnamese-American twenty-somethings, (Van (or V), her brother Jimmy, and his girlfriend Stephanie, and cousin Quinn Nguyen), and an older unmarried couple from LA, Southern and Rosemary. Since our group is small we will pick up a new guide in each city. We are very happy with our small group. We thought for sure we were going to be the youngest in a large group of senior citizens.