Day 2 - Caves, Restaurant & Family Time

Today was an absolute adventure! After such a short time here, we are already having a wonderful time!

Our drivers picked up the family at their home and then met us with another car at the hotel. Maelyn wanted to go in the car with her family to drive to the caves. Maelyn’s younger sister came with us in our car. Last year, this would have made us nervous – this year, not a problem at all! J

It was a bit of a drive to the caves and at one point we were quite high up in the mountains, to the point where I could feel the difference in elevation. The roads were quite twisty and once we arrived, the middle sister wasn’t feeling well and was car sick, poor thing.

Once she had some time to rest, we entered the caves, which were quite similar to the ones we visited in Guilin last year, except there were many, many more stairs in these caves. It was a long walk and very, very humid, but it gave us a lot of time to be together. The kids, especially, enjoyed being able to interact together. It is amazing, really, to see the bond they are able to create with one another without even being able to speak the same language!

At one point during our cave exploration Maelyn came over to me and told me how happy she is that we came on this trip. It made the stairs seems less daunting for this out-of-shape woman. J

After the caves, I was more than ready for a long ride back in the car as it gave us a chance to rest. While we were driving back, we came across an accident on the road and had to wait quite awhile for the truck to be towed out of the way. Maelyn once again travelled with her family and Paul and I were able to spend some quality time with Ailee.

We arrived at an amazing restaurant. The food was delicious, and the staff were very, very friendly. We are hoping to be able to go back to this restaurant at some point this week.

While at lunch, we were discussing the plans for the afternoon. We were talking about going back to the hotel for a rest. Maelyn spoke up and told us that she wanted to back to the family’s house to hang out for the afternoon. She wasn’t ready to say goodbye for the day. It only took me a second to say yes. I just felt….comfortable. I knew that they would take good care of her and it would provide her an opportunity to bond with her family. I sent her with my phone so that we could keep in contact and to help her be able to communicate with her family, using the translator. We kissed her and off she went – we were proud of her.

While Maelyn was gone, the three of us were able to spend more quality time together. We played solitaire, wrestled and snuggled.

During her visit, the family messaged us often to let us know how things were going, which was very thoughtful of them. She coloured with her youngest sister and they played for hours. She had a rest with all her sisters in her oldest sisters’ bed, all snuggled up together. Her dad made Maelyn her favourite noodles and even fed them to her. At the end of the night, he wanted to drive her back to the hotel on his scooter, but she was too nervous. Instead, we got our driver to come pick us up and then we went and got Maelyn. She was absolutely exhausted but very content.

The gift of spending time together is one we absolutely treasure.

Reunited

Once we had rested -- we slept about 5 hours -- we forced ourselves awake in an effort to get on the correct timezone.

Our guide told us that we would be going to the birth family's home for dinner. We were all tired, but excited to see our family once again. We also couldn't wait to see the changes in the home we saw last year, as it was in the middle of being constructed.

We parked outside the gates of the housing area and walked in. The land around the homes are still really muddy and full of rocks and some garbage. By then it was really dark and we walked towards the home carefully. When we got close to their front door, we saw that they were all in the entryway and greeted us with enthusiasm and confetti fireworks. Everyone hugged with complete joy and it was wonderful -- I would even say a relief -- to be together once again.

We were blown away by the inside of the home. It was beautiful!! Maelyn's father is in construction and he built the house himself and did an amazing job! The family gave the girls and I a bouquet of flowers each and it was really touching. We then saw that the family had created a large heart on the wall out of balloons for Maelyn -- so many ways to demonstrate how much they cared.

While we waited for dinner to be ready, Maelyn and her younger sister started playing a game of keep-up with the balloons and had a great time together! The dinner was a feast and we appreciated all the work they went to to get it all prepared. With the help of the translator, we were able to catch up with the family and tell them how happy we were to be there. Maelyn was able to reconnect with all of her sisters and it brought huge smiles to our faces to see them all together. It just felt right.

The night was full of laughter, catching up, celebrating, and many rounds of 'cheers!' A wonderful start to our time together.

Flying to China

We knew before we left that our journey to Wannian County would be long. That in order to save money, we had chosen flights that took us all over the place and we get us there, indirectly. We hoped that we would all be able to handle it and that we wouldn't regret our decision.

As it was Christmas Eve when we arrived at the airport in Toronto, we came across Santa Claus, who was handing out candy canes. The girls were thrilled with the treats, but wondered if security would allow them to bring them through to the plane ride. I reassured them that they could load up on them if they wanted to! We had an amazing lunch/dinner at a restaurant in the airport and enjoyed some comfortable downtime before the big journey.

Our flight from Toronto to Ottawa was a short one and we didn't have a long wait for our next flight to Vancouver. The flight to Vancouver, however, felt very long. I think anticipating that it was our 'shorter' flight set us up for feeling that the almost six hours we were in the plane passed way too slowly. When we landed, I was grateful that we had made a last-minute decision to switch hotels -- we were now staying at the hotel right in the airport.

The hotel was close by and absolutely beautiful! The girls loved the room and the view of the airplanes outside our windows. When we got in the room, we saw that the hotel had left a stocking full of treats of us, for Christmas. Once the kids were in bed, Paul and I sat on the floor together, chatted and enjoyed the treats ourselves!

The next morning, being Christmas morning, we decided to treat ourselves and we ordered room service for breakfast. We also knew that we had a long day ahead of us. The girls enjoyed the luxury of it and not having to get dressed and go out to eat. It was yummy!

I was nervous for our flight to Beijing -- being stuck in the airplane for thirteen hours is not my favourite way to travel, but it was necessary. The kids did an amazing job and we all survived. Ailee and Paul slept for a couple of hours, but Maelyn and I did not sleep at all.

Once we landed in Beijing, we were looking forward to checking into the airport hotel and getting a few hours of sleep, as we had a six hour layover before our next flight. Unfortunately, we found out that the hotel had closed down and that there wasn't any other option -- so we had to scour the terminal to find some empty benches. By this point, Ailee was beside herself with exhaustion. My priority was to get her as comfortable as possible on the chairs and let her sleep, which she did. Paul and Maelyn went in search of food and enjoyed some noodle soup together. Afterwards, Maelyn finally crashed and slept for about an hour and half. Waking her up when it was time to check into our next flight was not easy!

We hit a snag when we tried to check into the final flight. We had booked our tickets when Ailee had her old passport and they were not happy that she now had a new passport number. They didn't want to let us on the flight. I promised to fix the situation before we did our return flight at the end of the trip and they finally agreed. Phew!

When we landed in Nanchang two hours later, the girls were doing well and I was beyond exhausted. We met up with our guide and our driver for that night and began the two hour drive into Wannian County. It was 2:30 am, so the roads were nice and clear!

We checked into the hotel and very gratefully unpacked just enough to get ourselves to bed and finally get some rest.

Still not sure if the indirect travel was worth it or not -- time will tell!