Sunday, November 21, 2010

Flying within China







The Beijing Airport is HUGE and the Terminal 3 was built just for the Olympic Games. They size and scale of everything is incredible. We checked in as a group and headed to security. We did not have to remove our shoes but we did have to remove everything from our pockets (including non-metal objects) and pass through metal detectors and "wands" while our bags passed through x-ray. To get to our plane -- the entire group flying on that plane load onto a bus (standing room only!) and it drives us out onto the runway where it is a mad dash to get on the plane. It is rather strange that all seats are reserved but everyone wants to get on that plane right away. (The picture above was taken as we boarded the plane in Huangzhou to travel to Guangzhou)

The flight was smooth and nice and the service provided by the flight attendants was excellent. There was a movie (in Chinese) on the flight of nearly two hours and there was some mystery meat sandwich that was served that most in our group did not partake. Upon landing in Shanghai, we got our luggage and met our new tour guide "Hyphen" who took us to our waiting bus and took us to the waterfront where we enjoyed an incredible 45 minute cruise up and down the Shanghai Waterfront with its more than 1000 buildings over 100 meters tall all lit up in a colorful array of lights and moving billboards. It was stunning.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It's getting time to click your heals and say 'there's no place like home - there's no place like home'!!!!!!!!!!