After our visit to the Leshan Stone Buddha we stopped at this village on our way to Chengdu. It is an historic village dating back 1700 years. The village has been restored to its original charm but most of the original buildings have been turned into stores for souvenirs or food. We really enjoyed experiencing…
Two cities, a cruise, food tour and long, long flights later I’m still working on getting caught up on blog posts. While Chuck was working from an iPad with a keyboard most of my images are here on my iPhone so it’s a slow blogging process whenever we have access to WiFi. Because of a…
Lost Plate Food Tours is an absolute MUST DO when visiting China. Several years ago, when we were visiting Amsterdam, we did another food tour and now look for them everywhere we travel. I found Lost Plate Food Tours online and literally stalked them on Instagram, Facebook, their website, and YouTube! The owner is from…
Xi’an is known for its amazing dumplings, and it’s Dumplings Girls. During the Tang Dynasty beautiful women were curvy and voluptuous and their civilization was prosperous. The images of these dumpling girls are everywhere. Even as a modern day marketing symbol. On our first night in Xi’an we enjoyed the optional Dumpling Dinner. We looked…
If it’s true that an army travels on its stomach, our tour group is a mighty army. I’m going to look at our food from a bunch of different angles … for any of you reading this who might take offense, sorry / not sorry. First off, this is China, if you’re coming here for…
After we returned from a full day of sightseeing we went for a walk just a few blocks from the hotel to the Wangfujing Market. The market is actually a huge pedestrian walkway that looks much like Time Square in New York. It’s filled with very polished high-end stores, huge indoor shopping malls, and lots…
So, as you probably noticed Chuck is tackling all of the touring and I’ll be working on the hotel and food posts… Our first experience with Gate 1 Travel was our trip to Thailand a few years back and we found that the hotels and meals were very good. We were actually REALLY surprised when…
If you are like me you grew up hearing your mother say ‘ Clean your plate, there are starving children in China!” Yesterday was day one of our China vacation and I think Gate1 Travel and our Chinese hosts are out to prove that theory wrong. Our first function of the trip was breakfast in…
A major part of our vacation research involves stalking YouTube food vlogs for our upcoming trip to China. Now truthfully, we’ve booked a complete travel package with Gate 1 Travel. We worked with them on our trip to Thailand two years ago and could not have been happier. We know that all of our flights are…
We’ve been diligently researching for our upcoming trip to China. While Gate1 Travel does an amazing job with all of our travel plans, transportation, hotels, and sightseeing, they still offer a decent amount of free time. While Chuck’s birthday isn’t until August, technically this vacation is in celebration of his milestone birthday. He’s turning 60!…