Strolling and Shopping

Friday, March 20: Here's Jan and me before we boarded the plane on Wednesday. I'm sure we looked much more chipper then than we did today. We were both feeling tired, yet we still managed to get out and stroll around a bit and even began some of our shopping. The plan is to get most of it done before we receive Aidan on Monday.

Here's a shot of that great breakfast buffet at the White Swan Hotel. This isn't even the half of it. There are several other sections with an amazing assortment of foods.

Ran into these two fiddlers during our walk around Shamian Island, where our hotel is located. Wish I had brought my fiddle along. I would have fit right in with these two old codgers.

Shamian Island is acutally a little sandbank island in the Pearl River. It is separated by a small channel from the rest of Guangzhou's busy streets which you can see behind me in the picture of me and the fiddlers. It feels like more of a resort than part of a city whose metropolitan population is approaching 10 million. Below are a few shots of our stroll around the island today.

And here's my "coach" Jan with another pal she ran into outside the entrance to our hotel.

We ended the day with a couple of burgers at Lucy's, a friendly little American-style cafe a short walk from the White Swan. We ate outside since the temperature was quite pleasant, although you can feel the humidity. Thankfully it wasn't as hot today as we were expecting. That's me leaning against the "Lucy's" (although you can't see it) sign ... leaning not because of the Tsingtao, but because I'm ready to head back and relax for the rest of the evening, ready to recharge for tomorrow.