The Amazing Race Begins

We received a pleasant surprise a few days ago. We were informed that we will receive Liddia's passport on Wednesday afternoon (today) around 5:00 pm. Once we receive the visa we are free to travel home! Our original paperwork said we wouldn't be travelling home until Saturday.

Well, when we got that piece of news we jumped on it immediately. I emailed Dave and he listed us on a flight out of Hong Kong for Thursday morning.

So...soon we will feel like contestants on the show "The Amazing Race". The reason I say that is when we told our guides we needed to get to Hong Kong to fly home we got a blank look. Apparently they don't usually send people through Hong Kong. We were kind of on our own to figure out how to get from here to there.

When our guide looked for hotels for us he said they were $400 per night, so I took matters in my own hands, did a little research online and with a little help from a college friend who lives in Hong Kong found one for $200. Still super expensive in my book, but better than $400 and actually $200 is not a lot more than we are paying here, so I booked the room, and by leaving early we save money anyway, and more importantly, we get back to our boys earlier.

So, the amazing race begins. Once we leave Guangzhou, we are on our own, making our way to Hong Kong, getting from the train station to the hotel, from the hotel to the airport, all knowing very little Chinese. Hey, it will be an adventure, and because it means we are moving closer to our boys, she is up for it...I think. This look on Liddia's face captures the feeling

We leave for the Guangzhou East train station at 4:45 pm, which will be before we actually get Liddia's visa. Our guide will rush the visa to the train station and do a hand-off before we board the train. Our guide tells us "no provlem, I get you da visa, no provlem." Hopefully, it really will be, "no problem".

We will arrive in Hong Kong just after 8:00 pm. We then need to get to the hotel, hopefully we can find a taxi with enough room to take us an all our luggage.

On Thursday morning there is a shuttle from the hotel to the subway which will take us to the airport. Then we get on the 11:30 am flight to San Francisco. Then a few hours later we take a flight from SF to SLC.

If the stars line up we should arrive in SLC Thursday afternoon at 3:39 PM, and we will breath a sigh of relief to be HOME!

We have really enjoyed our stay in China, we have seen some amazing things and it has been very beautiful, especially in Guangzhou. Here are some pictures.