Beginning a Trip of a Lifetime!

One week and counting....... It has been a week in China thus far and Michelle and I are loving life! (Most of the time that is!) Catching the ferry to Shanghai was an relaxing and well needed time to compose ourselves for our next adventure into China. The 46 hours went suprisely fast and the highlight was definitely the sunrises and sunsets along the journey. After we were all packed with our 50 pound bags (seriously our backpacks might weight as much as me!), we stepped off the boat into a new country! Shanghai was amazing and truely enjoyed the city. It was so modern and cleaner that what I expected. Since Michelle and I are on a tight budget we have come across this new sight for backpackers called "CouchSurfing". You meet people through this website and request to stay with them. In Shanghai we stayed with a French guy who was simply a wonderful host! He showed us around the city, showed us the best dumpling stands around, how to eat the food, a bit about Chinese customs, and even the hot nightspots! We ended up staying there 5 nights and doing day trips out of Shanghai. It was wonderful to have a tour guide and also a comfortable home feeling instead of a hostel. A few China highlights so far have been..... 1. Viewing the most beautiful Chinese gardens that are composed of 4 elements: water, flowers, trees and buildings. Journeling and reflexing by the gorgeous atmosphere definitely lets you feel like you are in China. 2. Eating dumplings at every street corner! From fried to steamed....they are simply fabulous! Since English is limited, pointing at others food is the only way to go! Except when we didn't have a seat on the train so headed for the dining cart for a seat and a beverage. About an hour into the trip we thought we should order something so since no one spoke english we just pointed at some food that the locals were eating. We didn't realize it until we got the food that we had pointed to all the train workers food!!!! It was like the mass slop for all the employees...hahahah! 3. Train cart hopping is our new favorite job! Obtaining train tickets in China is definitely a challenge and have our times of hair pulling moments but we are surviving! Take this one great experience.....last minute we decided to head to a beach city for their beer festival! Well, we had hoped to get a night train from a city near Shanghai to there. NO SEATS! That is also another great saying that we have heard all tooo many times. Well, we finally got a hard class seat to a city about 3 hours from our destination site. We just knew we were going to be with barn animals and that is about the best describtion of it. Oh and the train was 12 hours long!!!! We got into our seats with all the locals and had our 50lbs bags with us. All I can say is that we were stared at like we were from Mars!!! Our luck changed a bit when we asked to upgrade our ticket and finally got a hard class sleeper which was 100 times better. However, getting there was the most hillarous thing! Think of two girls with huge backpacks on, shoes hanging off of them and a smaller backpack on our front, trying to walk through 11 train carts with people standing in the isles! Plus it was 100 degrees in there! Not so much fun at the time but so funny now! These are just a few funny experiences so far and I still have so much more to write about. Michelle and I are now off to the beer festival for some Chinese beer and drinking with the locals! A great time for sure and so different from Japan. I will post again soon and please feel free to add comments or send me an email! It is just so hard to respond to everyone so blogging is the easiest. Sorry about no pictures and hope to have some up next time!