Race Stats:
Team of Two: Me and my wife
Length: 8 days - October 25 thru November 2
Places: 6 cities
Transportation: 5 planes, 2 trains, 2 vans, 2 private cars, 1 bus, and numerous taxis


So for my week long race through China I have taken a detour from my wife and am at Hengdian World Studios, one of the largest studio complexes in China and Asia along with my brother-in-law and nephews. We have visited half the studio and decided to go eat lunch before exploring the second half of the studio. I’m used to having my wife help me with some of the food I’m not so familiar with, but this time I was with my in-laws who do not speak English. I wasn’t quite sure how this would work, but luckily my wife called to check in on us, and spoke to her brother. The lunch went well, and I was quite happy. The second half of the studio we saw a couple of things being shot. I also had the opportunity to get in costume and be wired up to look like I was flying like in a Chinese film … Though it probably would have made for a great picture I passed. We walked through all sorts of sets that looked like Chinese towns and villages, and watched a couple of small productions being shot while we were there.

We returned to my brother-in-law’s home with another drive through the country side, where many of my in-laws had gathered. I plugged in the video camera and showed them some of what I had shot at the studios. During our entire race I had my video camera I purchased just for this trip running. I purchased a $250 dollar JVC mini dv camera which worked great. My regular camera is more of a professional model, and I didn’t want to risk breaking or loosing it in China.

The rest of the day involved more visiting. My brother-in-law drove us over to my wife’s uncle’s place, but getting there proved to be quite a difficult task. At one point the street was so jammed it could not move … not just cars, the bikes as scooters could not get through either, it was a traffic mess. My brother-in-law noticing that the sidewalks were mostly clear, hopped the curb, and took his VW down the sidewalk. Nobody was hit, and we did get around the traffic mess ... It turned out an accident had caused the traffic jam, one of a few I saw while I was there. The visit with the Uncle was nice, and then later we traveling by taxi with some of my wife’s sisters to go shopping at few shops in Jinzhou. That night we said goodbye to some of the relatives and stayed at my brother-in-laws place before we started our next leg of the race.

Waking up early we drove to the airport by private car and then traveled by train from Jinzhou City to Shanghai for our 3rd leg of our race. We ended up in a sleeping unit on the train which we shared with another team … a young Chinese couple who was on their way to Shanghai. They were nice company for the 3 hour trip. We got off the train and took a taxi to the Manhattan hotel in downtown Shanghai. The hotel was nice, small room, but very close to all the tourist areas. We immediately found the beggars flock to these tourist areas and are not too shy about putting out their cup for some spare change. Shanghai was beautiful, and just like the pictures the buildings are amazing. I found so many of them to be like works of art. Flying over the skyline was the Goodyear Blimp, written in English on one side, Chinese on the other.

That evening we walked to the, Yuyuan Gardens area, a beautiful shopping district where all the traditional Asian styles buildings were lined with lights. During this leg of our race our task was to meet one of my wife’s former coworkers for dinner, who now lives and works in Shanghai. We ate at very popular restaurant in Shanghai which features a prominent picture of one of our former presidents dining there. Bill and Hillary were on the wall in a very nice display, along with other dignitaries who have eaten there. Part of surviving this trip was dealing with the cigarette smoke. Here in CA you can’t smoke anywhere, where in China people smoke almost everywhere. I probably inhaled more second hand smoke in the one week in China, then I have in 3 years in CA. After eating we traveled by taxi back to our hotel after some more shopping and settled in for a well needed pit stop.

The next morning we traveled by foot to do a little more shopping in Shanghai before we begun the next leg of the race. Taking a taxi we arrive at a very beautiful new train station there where we take a very modern train back to Hangzhou. In our first class section we had tv monitors, though nothing was showing on them. The view out the window of more Chinese country side and villages were interesting to see. After two hours we arrived in Hangzhou where we were to travel by taxi to our hotel. There we were to meet my wife’s nephew and niece, but first we had to survive getting a taxi. I’ve been in long lines in Vegas for a taxi but nothing like this. It looked like we had a long wait ahead of us, and as usual, our schedule had someone waiting for us. The line was in this enclosed hallway with a glass window looking out, so you could see the taxis coming, or lack of them, but to make things worse the hallway was quickly filling with lots of smoke …. My wife was starting to get impatient…..

To Be Continued….