Hoeffler Family World Trip 2017

Our first stop in Xi'an - the Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum. Also known as the "terra cotta warriors".

The terra cotta warriors were built to protect the tomb of China's first emperor about 200 BC. It is estimated that over 700,000 workers were involved in the construction of the tomb and almost 10,000 terra cotta statues were buried in the three pits near the Emperor's tomb. The statues were built to protect the emperor in the afterlife.

The terra cotta army was not discovered until 1974 when a local farmer was digging for a water well! Many now consider the site to be the 8th wonder of the world.

Who could resist trying terra cotta armor suits on for size?

We were entertained in Xi'an by a traditional Chinese theatrical performance with drama, music, costumes and dance.

The ancient Xi'an city wall lit up. Lots of locals out at night with a buzz on the streets.

We flew from Xi'an to Chongqing where we set sail on the Viking Emerald for a six day cruise on the Yangtze River.

The metropolitan area of Chongqing is reported to have over 52 million people making it the largest city in the world. And until two weeks ago, we had never heard of it. Everywhere we went in China we visited cities with 8 million, 12 million, 18 million. And we had never previously heard of any of them!

View of the Yangtze out of our room on the ship.

We cautiously walked across the swaying "drunken bridge" to visit the Shibaozai Temple - twelve stories high.

We then spent the afternoon roaming the town of Shibaozai.

Our tour guide Francis with the kids below. A native of Bejing and fluent in English, he was educational (more history than we could handle), funny, and an all around terrific guide. We were very grateful we had him leading the way!

We toured the three gorges of the Yangtze on a Sampan boat.

Dramatic scenery but a cloudy rainy day softened the views.

On the same day we visited the controversial Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze. The dam displaced 1.3 million Chinese and flooded hundreds of villages, cities and archeological sites. On the positive side it controls flooding downstream and is now considered the world's largest construction site.

Moving through the five locks of the three gorges dam late at night. This was one of the highlights of the river cruise.

On another day the kids and Carol learned how to play Mahjong on the ship. They played for five hours!

The crew on the ship were very friendly. A waiter on the ship, Marco (below), invited Carol and I off the ship one day for a walk to a local park to play ping pong.

In the city of Jingzhou we were able to visit a local school. The kids entertained us with some songs and martial arts. We then went into their classroom and tried to teach them some English.

This young girl took my hand and wanted me to sit at her desk - she liked me because I was also wearing glasses.

Selfie from the terrace of our stateroom.

The construction in China is mind boggling.

One of the many bridges under construction spanning the Yangtze.

In the city of Wuhan (population 10 million with 1.7 million college students), we visited the Hubei Musuem. While there we were entertained by a bell concert and viewed the ancient bells buried in an emperor's tomb over 2,000 years ago. The culture here at the time was 1,000 years ahead of the rest of the world!

While we were here, we came across a group of military air force officers. At the same time, we were reading about the escalation of the US and North Korea conflict. We waved to the officers and flashed them a peace sign - which made most of them smile!

A kite vendor along the river.

Another temple - this one in Wuhan.

Next stop Shanghai!

While in China we had limited internet and no access to google - so we need to do some catch up with our blog. Our first stop in China was Bejing. We were on a Viking tour for our entire two weeks in China - which was quite a change from the travel pace we had kept the previous weeks. These tours get you going early and keep you going all day... Our group of 38 had just two other couples from the US - most were from the UK and a few were from Canada. It was nice to have a different slant on world events as we read in the papers about the North Korea military escalation and then the visit of China's President, Xi Jinping, to the US.

Our first day we spent at Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City. It was a national Holiday in China so both were packed with Chinese tourists. It was fun to see so many Chinese excited to see these treasured sites.

Photos of Tienanmen Square below. The scale is so impressive.

The portrait of Chairman Mao is re painted every month.

The Forbidden City is 9,999 1/2 rooms large. This was the Chinese Imperial Palace occupied from 1420 (Ming Dynasty) to 1912 (Qing Dynasty). The bronze pots were used for fire control!

More photos from around Bejing...

Impressive modern architecture everywhere in China. This was one of my favorites in Bejing.

Our first night we went to a Kung Fu performance at the "Red Theater". Another night we had a traditional Peking Duck dinner.

Our second day in Bejing we were up early and headed to the Great Wall at 6 am. Again it was a national Holiday and we wanted to beat the crowds of Chinese who would be visiting.

We hiked the wall for about two hours. Again so impressive to see and experience. We were quite surprised by the steep pitch of many of the sections. We could have spent a full day here but with a tour we were moving at the pace of our group.

Later that day we visited the Sacred Way of the Ming Tombs. Along the way, the kids were asked to pose for photos with many of the Chinese. The Chinese couldn't believe how tall our kids were for their ages. During our time in China the kids were asked dozens of times to pose for photos! Below is a photo we took of people lining up to take their photos. We were all very surprised by this!