Let the the blog marathon begin!! Its been a month since Spring Festival and its about time I updated on all of our adventures. There will be lots of photo's and stories to walk you through the amazing trip I was blessed to go on last month. All of the photo's are thanks to the amazing Melodie Chandler, seeing as my camera was stolen (dont worry we'll get there eventually).
And we're off....
We left from Wuhan and traveled first to Yuangshou, China. We were so excited and ready to leave when we caught the bus to the train station...
Little did we know that traffic was going to be so awful and it was going to take us forever to get to the train station giving us only 10-15 minutes to find and get on our train. So, with everything on our backs and in our hands the only foreigners in the station took off running in all directions trying to figure out where we were supposed to be. Needless to say it wasn't the way we saw the trip starting off but it was hilarious once we actually made it on the train. I cant even imagine what the Chinese people were thinking as they watched us sprint through the station with all of our things, not really having any clue where we needed to go. This picture is us on the train in our hard sleeper beds.
The train ride was pretty smooth although it did feel like we were taking forever and stopping at every city imaginable. ha. Not to mention the Chinese people who are up at 4:30am playing their music and having a great time rising WAY too early. But we made it to Yuangshou!! It was colder than expected and cloudy but SO beautiful.
We found a place to stay for a great price as soon as we walked into town.
The mountains that surrounded the city were beautiful! It's difficult to put into words how unique this city is. It felt almost as if we were in a little mountain get away. We spent most of our time walking around checking out the city and of coarse shopping.
On our last day in Yuangshou we took a bike tour, we treated our guide who's english name was Peter to McDonald's before we set out for a 16 mile ride through the country side and villages.
The bike tour was one of my favorite things we did the entire trip, it was incredibly beautiful and Peter was an awesome guide!
Family photo..
Oh these three... there was never a dull moment with these guys around! :)
Along the way we stopped at the Gold water cave. Here we had a chance to explore the caves, roll around in some mud (which was FREEZING) and then enjoy the hot springs.
Our guide through the caves was really kind but if we would have had money for every time she said "Be careful" we would have been rich in a matter of minutes. She was apparently very concerned for our safety.
We came across Buddha in the cave.... naturally formed... or man made... hmmm... Oh and please notice the technicolored lights. The Chinese really know how to spruce up a dull cave... haha.
MUD!! This is all of us freezing and trying to collect our things so we could rinse off and go get in the hot springs. And although it was cold, it was a really fun experience. The Chinese people had a great time laughing at us too.
After the caves we biked to Moon Mountain. Here we got off and hiked up the stairs to the top. Once again, it was so beautiful. There is just no other way to describe it. The whole day was incredible being surrounded by His creation. It was a blessing away from all of the pollution and noise we're used to.
This was a restaurant we found and kept going back to... how awesome to have such a light in this little town!
We found a place to stay for a great price as soon as we walked into town.
The mountains that surrounded the city were beautiful! It's difficult to put into words how unique this city is. It felt almost as if we were in a little mountain get away. We spent most of our time walking around checking out the city and of coarse shopping.
On our last day in Yuangshou we took a bike tour, we treated our guide who's english name was Peter to McDonald's before we set out for a 16 mile ride through the country side and villages.
The bike tour was one of my favorite things we did the entire trip, it was incredibly beautiful and Peter was an awesome guide!
Family photo..
Oh these three... there was never a dull moment with these guys around! :)
Along the way we stopped at the Gold water cave. Here we had a chance to explore the caves, roll around in some mud (which was FREEZING) and then enjoy the hot springs.
Our guide through the caves was really kind but if we would have had money for every time she said "Be careful" we would have been rich in a matter of minutes. She was apparently very concerned for our safety.
We came across Buddha in the cave.... naturally formed... or man made... hmmm... Oh and please notice the technicolored lights. The Chinese really know how to spruce up a dull cave... haha.
MUD!! This is all of us freezing and trying to collect our things so we could rinse off and go get in the hot springs. And although it was cold, it was a really fun experience. The Chinese people had a great time laughing at us too.
After the caves we biked to Moon Mountain. Here we got off and hiked up the stairs to the top. Once again, it was so beautiful. There is just no other way to describe it. The whole day was incredible being surrounded by His creation. It was a blessing away from all of the pollution and noise we're used to.
This was a restaurant we found and kept going back to... how awesome to have such a light in this little town!
Now we come to Nanning.... I am going to put out a disclaimer now, we were only here to get our visa's into Vietnam and were only able to see/be in a very outside part of the city.... with that being said... Nanning was well, definitely not the highlight of the trip. There is honestly not much to say because we were pretty much bored out of our minds.
We arrived in Nanning after the WORST train ride imaginable.. it was an overnight train and we had to get seats instead of beds, which meant lights on, loud people, funny smells, and no sleep. Once we arrived at 7am we then had to walk around the city in the cold rain to try and find a place to stay.. haha. Looking back it really does make me laugh at how tired, frustrated, sleep deprived and irritated we all were. BUT we did finally find a place to stay. I think the hardest part about Nanning was that we had nothing to do... it was cold and rainy without any type of entertainment.. so we hung out in the rooms...
Jac, Paul and Beau played their never ending battle of Temple Run...
This is how Mel and I felt about the game......
But there was one wonderful day where Melodie and I decided to venture out, eat Pizza Hut and go see a movie! It was the saving day for Nanning...
Finally we were on our way to Vietnam riding in style in the very front on the bus. (we had such incredible favor on this trip, even in the small things. I have really bad motion sickness and we were some of the last to get tickets yet still landed the front seats.!! :))
Just some more random "favor facts" from the first part of the trip that I think are more than note worthy...1.Peter our bike tour guide was not only super sweet, through conversation we found out he has good friends who live in his city that are believers. People who have spoken with him, invested in him and given him the Word. This was so encouraging for the simple fact that it was proof of Dad moving in His body. That there are others out there spreading and investing in His Kingdom!
2. The main reason for us being in Nanning was to get our Visa's into Vietnam, seeing as we didn't plan ahead for anything on this trip we just showed up trusting there would be a way...We had looked online at around how much it should cost and how many days it should take first then we spoke with the woman at the front desk of our hotel (she spoke some english) and asked if they could take care of it at the hotel. She ended up calling her friend "Joe". Joe (his english name) came and met us and told us he could get us our Visa's a day sooner and for less than the prices online.... we all realized this was going to be a risky decision seeing as we were about to hand this man our passports but we went with it. Joe was so helpful and arrived exactly when he said he would with our Passports in hand! :) (Also fun fact, Joe was originally from Huangshi, the city I live in!)
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