Nanjing Wall with Pictures

Today we got to discover more of Nanjing's history and beauty.  We met up with Alaina and Andrew Falk for this adventure.  They will share Gotcha day with us tomorrow with their beautiful daughter, Emmi.  She is so precious and I'm thrilled that I get to be part of their big day, too.
In order to keep our trip from being any longer than it already is, we decided to skip Beijing.  The main thing that I was wanting to see there was the Great Wall.  When Mitch came home from his China trip this summer, he was full of stories about how incredible it is to see.  Doing some study, we learned about the City Wall of Nanjing.  It is the largest city wall still standing and the main 5 tiered gate is still funtional.  I've been told that the wall is actually some taller and wider than the Great Wall but obviously MUCH shorter.  I am so glad we got to see it.  It is just amazing.  They estimated that originally several billion, with a b, bricks were used.  I found it fascinating that each brick was hand made and signed with the name, date and province of the maker.  They were held personally accountable if the brick failed.  Yikes, I bet they were each well made.  I'm not sure you would want to fail the emperor in those days.
After that we walked around with our guide, Jin.  It was pretty funny.  She steered us to the right places to eat or to shop.  For example, when someone tried to show us rock from the Yangtze river, she said "Don't listen to him, those aren't real."  She then showed us others in his shop that were cheaper and were real.  She showed us a shop to get a delicious snack of candied strawberries on a stick, yumm...Later she took us to a restaurant frequented by locals and helped us order dumplings.  There was no English to be found, I was very glad she did the ordering.  The dumplings are not pretty but, wow, they were delicious.  It could have been that we were all ready for food but either way, we loved them.  :)
It was a wonderful way to pass a day that otherwise would have seemed to have lasted forever.  In just 16 hours, we'll have Jaden.  :)
  It was pretty smoggy out but that made it all seem more mystical.  In one of the caves that the warriors used to hide in to surprise the enemy, someone was playing saxaphone.  It really fit the atmosphere.  Enjoy the following pictures.  They probably don't really do the area justice.

dumplings, not Kirby's but delicious