G’day to 2011, another binary year in short date format!
This year I’m particularly looking forward to to Remembrance Day – 11:am on 11-11-11! Hopefully this will be a favourable year as we are at yet another crossroads in our lives. At the moment all I can tell you is what we have planned for January – and it’s pretty darned incredible if I do say so myself.
Starting this coming Sunday (2nd of January) we’re off to Beijing for three days to see the Great Wall, the Forbidden City and numerous other sites of interest. On January 5th we’re flying north.. way north to a city called Harbin overnight to see the Ice Festival where the temperatures are forecast to be a maximum of –17’C and a minimum of a balmy –24’C!! Here’s the weather forecast, in case you don’t believe me.
After a quick stopover in Beijing, we’ll be in the inland city of Xi’an (home of the terracotta warriors) for the day on the 7th before flying home to HangZhou that same day – phew!
On January 19th we’re off to Tokyo via Shanghai, where we’ll spend a few days before heading southwest to the former Imperial seat of power in Kyoto before travelling on to Nara and Himenji. We’ll then bullet train back to Tokyo for the return flight to Shanghai on January 26th.
Given all the excitement it may be possible to forget we have no jobs to return to! Despite all this, we also need to figure out whether we are staying in HangZhou or China.. or moving on to newer pastures.. we don’t know what will happen! Stay tuned, it’s sure going to be interesting.
Happy New Year and all the best in 2011.
Rob and Toni
Nice one, I love this post and I like your blog.