Guilin, China - Boat Trip up the River

Our transportation to our Hotel.

A four hour boat ride up the river.

A local fruit vendor ...

who delivers right to the boat.

Haleigh and Ammon enjoyed some 

self-motivated square dancing on the deck.

The dock at Yongshou

We experienced the most

BEAUTIFUL ride of our lives!

Guilin, China - The Beginning

This begins one of the most 

AMAZING trips of my LIFE.

I will NEVER forget the things 

I experienced in Guilin, China.

Thursday, November 10 

at 10:30 PM

we boarded a plane going from Hong Kong

to Guilin, China.  Our family would be traveling

with our friends, Olivia and Frederik Geertsema

from Holland, but we know them from

our Branch in Discovery Bay, and

Josh Anderson, Caleb's friend, 

who is visiting from 

HOME - Cumming, Georgia.

On the plane we were served a snack in a box.
It was said to be ...

warmth - refreshing - harmonious - nourishing

It was a roll, a piece of sponge cake and 

4 TINY crab apples.

After the hour flight a driver picked us up

at the airport

and took us to the Guilin Bravo Hotel.

The Hotel Lobby

The accessories and furnishings of the lobby

were very Chinese.

Haleigh and Olivia felt like royalty

sitting on these, what they called,

Chinese thrones.

In the morning we could see the mountains

in the distance trying to poke through

the pollution of the city.

Even with the pollution it was beautiful.

We checked out of the hotel,

took a few shots of the beautiful

 little park across the street

then jumped in a van that would take us

to the boat we would ride up the river

to Yangshuo.

It was a BEAUTIFUL ride!

This was just the beginning -

little did we know the BEAUTY that awaited us.

HALLOWEEN in Discovery Bay

Discovery Bay's North Plaza

Little did we know what we were getting into

when we rented a house on Headland Drive

in Discovery Bay, Hong Kong.

We were told Halloween would be 

MADNESS but some

things you can't fully understand until you 

experience them for yourself.

Headland Drive is the only accessible street 

in Hong Kong with houses rather than

apartments.  So on Halloween night

all of Hong Kong comes to Discovery Bay's

Headland Drive.

Decorations

We went with SIMPLE,

AND FUN!

More like a PARTY
than a graveyard.

Most of the homes on Headland chose

the scary, gory, creepy style.
Blood and guts.

We didn't want to frighten our LITTLE guests.

We did FLAGS,

BALLOONS

and LUMINARIES.

Costumes

The boys chose to color their hair.

(Danger of the plastic bag!)

-Caleb did green -

-- Ammon went Black --
and
-- Haleigh wore a glittery witch hat. --


Trick-or-Treaters

Let the festivities begin!

The Trick-or-Treaters started arriving just before 5PM.

The streets to Headland were blocked off

and security was out in force.

Haleigh was our MUSIC mixer,

photographer and professional candy hander outer.
She did an AWESOME job!

At about 5:45 our GUESTS began to arrive.

We invited our friends from the Branch at Church

to come for Chili, Apple Cider and Bread.

At 6:00 the CROWDS started to pour in.

We couldn't hand out the TREATS fast enough.

It was CRAZY.

Some people were nice enough to

bring US a bag of treats and say

"THANK YOU for doing this."

While CRAZINESS was happening outside,

we ENJOYED the peace and quiet inside.

At 7:30, after handing out 2,000 PLUS
(YES - two thousand plus) treats,

we closed the gate.

We had NOTHING more to hand out.

The crowds, however, kept coming.
Headland stayed packed with Trick-or-Treaters

for a good 45 minutes after we stopped.

8:30ish - The PARTY was over.

Time to get my MELTING little man

cleaned up and IN BED.

HALLOWEEN and Trick-or-Treating

will never be the same

after living on Headland Drive.