We made it Home!

We have now been home for almost a week, and are almost recovered. Lexi has been amazing and Karen is starting to recover. Lexi has the requisite ear infection and cold, but her brothers love her and she has quickly become a part of the family.

To tie things up, I have some pictures and video from our last days in Guangzhou and our trip home and some video from the Great Wall that is worth viewing.

Our trip from Beijing to Chicago was uneventful, nee; even pleasant. The United flight attendants were wonderful - they made a bed for Lexi on the bulkhead and she slept for almost the whole trip. When the junior flight attendant has 34 years of experience, you know you have a sought-after route.

First - our review of the Sino-Swiss Hotel:



And our final lunch with our new friends:





And Dr. Allen:



And Candy at the Airport:



Getting ready to go:






Lexi was already comfortable on the plane:




The trip to Chicago only took 12 hours, which seemed much shorter than our trip over (maybe it was because we slept a bit). Once we landed, I stopped to retrieve the strollers which we were told would arrive at the end of the jetway by a woman who could barely speak English. I had just spent two weeks in China with people that spoke the language better, and here was an incompetent that could barely spit out the language. Needless to say, we DID NOT get the strollers and were last in line at immigration. United may have great senior flight attendendants, but their ground staff leaves a lot to be desired. As one of our travel mates said - at least things were predictable and on time in China. The strollers did finally show at the baggage claim.

We did get through immigration and customs, and Lexi became a citizen (once again - how cool is that!) and then sat in O'Hare for the next three hours, changing gates three times. That's what you get for flying through Chicago in the winter.

We finally landed at Bradley at about 12 AM - and yes - it was still Thursday. Fortunately, it became Friday by the time we walked in the door at home. After 15000 miles and over 24 hours of travel, we had made it back. And Karen has never looked so peaceful on an airplane:



In the interest of posting everything that was interesting (at least everything that I found interesting) - here are a few more video clips from the trip. The first is from early in the trip - footage from the Great Wall that is truly amazing:



And video from our Buddhist blessing:

As I process more of the video, I will put it up - I have video from the Forbidden City, Tienanmen Square, and the Temple of Heaven.

Thank you to everyone for following our trip and meeting our daughter. It was a truly incredible, once in a lifetime experience.