Day 2 - Friday, July 5 - The Great Wall

We've been grateful to have Bethany Christian Services as our adoption agency.  They know what they're doing, having helped families like ours bring home thousands of orphans from China over the years.  A key part of the trip is the first few days.  They intentionally have you arrive in the country four to five days before you receive your child. This helps parents gain a good understanding of the child's culture, while also giving a few days to get over the jet lag.

April and I were talking earlier today about how glad we are that we're taking these first few days at the beginning of the trip like Bethany recommended.  We tried to imagine receiving our little girl the morning after having been traveling for 27 straight hours.  Suffice it to say, it would have been awful.  We would have been a mess. She would have been a mess. It would have been a mess all the way around!

Our guide took us to the Great Wall today - a once in a lifetime experience. We climbed SO MANY STAIRS.  My phone told me it was equivalent to 74 flights!  We climbed... climbed a little more, rested for a minute, climbed more... and well, you get it.  The views were breathtaking and it was so significant to stand on such an historic spot. It was a moment none of us would forget. And to cap it off, we were able to FaceTime back to Fresno and talk to Titus, Audrey, Grandma and Grandpa.

All in all, it was the perfect way to spend our first full day in China. Tomorrow will be Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City, Hutong Tour and an Acrobatic show. More to come...

Day 1 - Sacramento to Beijing (via Shanghai)

Thank you Greg Thwing for the ride. 

Wednesday, July 3... the beginning of the final journey to get Emilia. 

Upon arriving at the Sacramento airport we learned that our flight would be delayed up to a half hour. We figured we could handle that since we would still have an hour to make our connection in San Francisco. Well... that was not to be.  The Sacramento flight ended up being delayed so long that we missed our flight to Beijing, but United came through and rerouted us through Shanghai. 

Waiting in Shanghai

Shanghai was another adventure as we had a pretty tight connection transferring from an international flight to domestic.  This time it was Air China that came through in the bind, and allowed us to check in for a flight that they had already closed.  We were able to get through security quickly, gate check our bag, and then... wait... because of course this flight was delayed.  The delay gave us some time to regroup and then we were off to Beijing.  

We've finally made it to Beijing.

Our guide Helen met us at the airport, and off we went to our hotel to finally get to bed sometime around 12:30am local time.  All said, it was about a 27 hour travel day.  Exhausted and excited, off to bed we went.

It's finally time to head out!

United Airlines 777-200 Departing San Francisco

It's finally time to head out! I can't even begin to tell you how excited we are to have this moment finally upon us. Every day, multiple times a day for the last month, we've been checking the message portal from Bethany Christian Services, our adoption agency to see if there is any new travel info for us that will give an idea of when we're going. Three months ago, Bethany  told us that travel typically happens about three months from when you receive the "Letter of Acceptance."  Well, they nailed that prediction to within one day.

Wednesday morning (July 3) we'll catch a puddle jumper to San Francisco and then spend the next 12 hours on a United 777 on our way to Beijing. (Aviation geeks click here to see the flight track of yesterday's flight.)

Nanchang - Jiangxi Province

Sunday the 7th, we head to Nanchang where we'll finally get to meet Emilia (that's what we're naming her) for the first time and spend the week settling in and getting to know each other.  Leading up to this, we've assumed Nanchang to be kind of a small town for China - you know, maybe the size of Fresno. Well... I guess we really need to rethink our understanding of "small" in China, because Nanchang is a small city of 5 million!

US Consulate - Guangzhou

Saturday the 13th, we're off to Guangzhou where we'll spend the remainder of our time securing her Visa to enter the U.S.  And then we'll finally catch a non-stop flight on China Southern back to L.A. (Airbus A380 double decker - And our seats our in the center section - very last row.)

China Southern A380 Landing at LAX

We cap that day off with a quick hour and a half flight on Southwest back to Sacramento and then it's time to truly begin living in this next chapter of Carey Family Life.

We think we have a departure date

We just got word yesterday that there's a pretty good chance we'll be heading to China next Wednesday the 3rd. We're waiting on the US Consulate in Guangzhou to grant our Visa appointment, and then we'll know for sure.  I'll keep you updated!