Friday, February 8, 2008

Lunar New year




We spent the Chinese New Year up in Harbin which is the capital city of Heilongjiang province, the northern most province in China. To say it was cold was an understatement! Daily tempatures ranged from -15 to -30 degrees celsius. We stayed warm and had a wonderful time adding lots of memories to our China experience. Here are a few highlights.

Day 1 Monday February 4th.
We arrived about 5 hours later than planned since our flight out of Shanghai was delayed. We checked right into our hotel and put on a few extra layers and headed right over to Ice World. Ice World is just what it sounds like, a world of ice. Although not the warmest time of day, it is best visited at night as all the sculptures are light up in day-glow colors. There were dozens of ice sculptures, replicas of the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, the Acropolis, London Bridge, and lots of slides and snow castles. The kids had a blast racing up and sliding down all the snow slides. They also got to toboggan, ride ice bikes (bikes with blades instead of wheels), snowmobile (around a track) and eat frozen fruit kebabs! Noah was the first to cry mercy and the other two weren't far behind. I think we stayed about 2 1/2 hours! My feet were frozen!










Thomas trying to slide without sitting on the ice!






"I double-dog dare you!!" Don't do it Sophie!


Jon trying the ice wall. He is climbing up after Sophie who nimbly scampered up and waited for dad at the top!







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