We were meant to fly out of Melbourne at 11.45pm but, thanks to works on the long runway which started at 12 midnight on the dot, we had to wait for staff to empty some cargo so that we were light enough to take off from the shorter runway. Two hours later, with an already exhausted little boy, we were very relieved to finally hit the skies at 2am. Thankfully, Adyn decided to sleep (almost) the entire flight. He woke just as breakfast was being served. Total = 9 hours (half of that was in my arms due to turbulence).
There are TWO things we couldn’t have travelled without:
1. Boobies: yes my 18month old STILL breast feeds, and yes all the funny looks are highly entertaining (at least for me anyway).
2. Our new ERGObaby Carrier. I can’t get over how comfortable it is and with 2 hours straight at Hong Kong I was still comfortable and happy to be carrying my little 10.6kg boy.
Although Adyn loves to walk (or should I say run), the distance we had to walk in one of the three airports was tiring, even for me. At Hong Kong airport we also had to take the train (it travels so fast, if you blink you’ll miss the ride) and a bus to get to our gate (507). Adyn was well protected and safe from slamming doors in his ERGO. He also loved being able to bury his head into my chest to hide from the constant hands wanting to touch him. The Chinese seem to have a fascination with his (extremely) long eye lashes and almond shaped eyes. At least that’s what I think they’re trying to tell us as we don’t understand them and they can’t understand us (which makes for an entertaining conversation).
Driveway lined with leaf-less trees
After 1 car ride, 3 planes, 1 train and 1 bus we finally arrived in Jinan only to be ushered to another car by our driver, Mr Lee, to make the last hour of our journey by car. I had been told about the roads and driving here but wow!! Mr Lee was relatively tame compared to some of the other drivers on the road (may be because we had Adyn with us). The expressways are extremely wide and seem to flow really well. Unless there’s an accident at which time what looks like 2 lanes to us seems to become 4 or 5 lanes for the Chinese. Yet with all the weaving, honking and gasping in fear there were no further accidents and the traffic never once stopped flowing. Adyn’s new favourite sound is now “beep beep” though.
Xuehua Hill Hotel
After all that drama we arrived safely in our Hotel only to encounter our next battle… communication. With a lot of pointing and gesturing we managed to get to our room, and even managed to order dinner (with a bit of help from 1 (partially) english speaking waiter). Everyone seems to be obsessed with Adyn. They want to hold and cuddle him and he is getting very overwhelmed… enter the ERGO. For some reason when he is in his carrier the staff seem to take it as a sign to keep away and wave from a distance. So, from now on when he needs a break the ERGO will be happily worn.
View from the hotel carpark (not visible by the afternoon due to smog)
This morning Jacob had to check in at work, so Adyn and I took a brief walk around the grounds. There looks to be a lot of mountains around here which I look forward to exploring. ERGObaby and Baby legs were both happily worn this morning! Sadly, Adyn’s body clock is yet to adjust, so our walk was cut short by a very tired little boy (hopefully we can get him sleeping in his ERGO so we don’t have to rush home when he gets tired).
Hoping some snow arrives soon. We can’t wait to introduce Adyn to snow! It’s actually quite warm here (for winter) at the moment. The trees have shed all their leaves and the ground is all brown just waiting for the snow to beautify it. The hotel is building their giant Christmas tree out the front complete with a giant star. We look forward to telling you all about our exploration of the area in our next post.
Otherwise Jacob has every Sunday off and we WILL be using this as our main travel and sight see days.
