China Trip - December 23, 2004
Today was the big travel day that we had been dreading. We spent the morning packing and buying a few last-minute gifts. We had to have our bags in the hallway by 10am, so effectively our "travel" began then. We loaded onto the bus at 1:30pm to go to the airport. This shows our great baby bag, which keeps bottles warm for a very long time. It also shows some new boots on Elisa that we bought at the wholesale store just before we left.
We ended up having to purchase another large piece of luggage to hold all the stuff we bought in China. Fortunately, we had an extra passenger with us, so we were eligible for two extra bags. (We could have bought more!). These to full carts are all of our stuff. The men with the red caps are the porters, who handle your bags all the way from the bus to the check in counter for about $1.50 per cart. Notice the pink "Family Outreach International" ribbons on our bags.
In contrast to our large amount of luggage, Bob left China with only one bag to check and two small carry-on bags. He came by himself, leaving his wife at home to take care of their other baby. So he was doing the Daddy Decathlon for two weeks!
We did not really have lunch, other than some very expensive ice cream bars at the airport. We saved some eggs and noodles from Elisa's room-service lunch at the hotel. Even thought it was cold at this point, Elisa wolfed it down.
Here's Elisa on the long airplane ride from Beijing to Vancouver in one of the rare peaceful moments.
It was a VERY long flight, and Elisa never really got comfortable. Elisa was squirmy all night, but did manage to get a little sleep.
We walked her up and down the airplane and did little pretend-walking loops in the galley in the back of the plane for hours.
After the sun rose, we had breathtaking views of Alaska and British Columbia.
Finally, we got to Vancouver and went through the customs and immigration process. On our airplane, in addition to the 12 babies from our group, there was another group of families with 8 more babies. So they opened up a special customs line for families with adoptive babies.
Glad to be off the plane! The couple in front of us in the line was from the other adoption group, and were seated right behind us on the plane. Another family from that group was seated in front of us, so we had lots of company.
Since our flight arrived in Vancouver too late to connect to any of the daytime flights to Toronto, we got a day room at the beautiful Fairmont Hotel, which is right inside the Vancouver airport.
In the hotel room, Elisa could play and get some sleep. We had a wonderful room-service lunch, and all took naps and bathed. Elisa really enjoyed the large bathtub, and got on her stomach in the tub to practice her breast stroke, complete with the dolphin wiggle-kick used by the Olympic swimmers. The hotel room had a great view of the runways, and had amazing sound-proofing.
This is what Elisa thinks of Canada!
As I type this, Elisa is napping in her crib. We'll have to wake her shortly to go downstairs into the terminal to catch our flight to Toronto, which departs at 10:45 pm local time. I notice on my computer clock that it is now after midnight EST, so Merry Christmas Eve!
Hey Santa, we'll race you across the continent!