The first day

Our first full day was spent sightseeing at the Summer Palace, Tiananmen Square/Forbidden City and a marketplace. Other than the Great Wall, which we did on our second full day here in Beijing, these places seem to be the top tourist attractions in Beijing. Getty Images got us a van and a driver (who spoke very little English) and our group was escorted around town.

The first spot was the Sumer Palace. The Summer Palace is the largest imperial garden in the world. We were at the Palace for about an hour or so just walking around and then we got a call from Harry and he said we need to go find the lake. The lake was absolutely stunning as you can see from the photos. The Summer Palace is also the first place that I got asked by a local to have a picture with them. An old man came up to me and had his wife take a picture with me. Luckily Jed was there to get a picture of the man with me and I’m just waiting for the photo so I can post it here. My moment of celebrity is nothing compared to the attention Patrick gets but I want to save that for another blog at another time.

After the Summer Palace we ate lunch at a dumpling shop in a non-tourist part of town. Being that our group was so big and made up of Americans and Brits the entire dining staff was excited to see us come in. From the cooks to the waitresses they were all snapping photos of us with their cell phone cameras. It was a very cool experience to see how excited they became when we arrived. The food was outstanding as well as we had many different types of dumplings.

After lunch we headed over to Tiananmen Square, which is the world’s largest gathering place. The history and the massive size of the structure was simply remarkable. As you walk through the square and reach the building with the picture of Chairman Mao you enter the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City is a massive Palace and is like a mile long. Its not exactly my idea of what a Palace would look like but I’m the emperors enjoyed it. There is a ton of empty space. If I was designing a Palace I would make it more like the Playboy Mansion but that’s just me.