Christmas Vacation (Part One)

Christmas in Shenzhen did not disappoint. We decided that since we had just moved here it would be fun to fly the kids to us and celebrate Christmas in Shenzhen. We had also been thinking that we would be in our apartment by now and we could all be in the same place, but no such luck. So with the arrival of our three children we checked out of our temporary digs and into the Shenzhen Hilton.

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This was probably one of the best ideas we have had in a long as our two bedroom apartment where we are currently living, was too small for five people and getting smaller by the day. The move to the Hilton enabled us to have a change of scenery, have some room to move around and sleep in a soft, luxurious ‘just like home’ bed!

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We just took it easy the first day and hung around Sea World.

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Our children decided that we needed to take some pictures so they could be Instagram stars.

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By the second day we were ready to roll so we hopped the metro and took the kids to the Window of the World theme park. This is not a theme park as we know it (nothing here is as we know it) there are no giant roller coasters. It has about 130 miniature replicas of some of the most famous tourist attractions in the world squeezed into 48 hectares or 118 acres. The reproductions are grouped according to regions and everything is built to some sort of scale. Some of The Amazing Race 28 was filmed here in 2016 if you’re into that show. People here laugh at this place and call it cheesy. It kind of is, but if you can’t go to the world, the world can come to you. We decided that it was kind of fun because you could plan a future vacation to see the things you hadn’t seen or didn’t even know about. Enjoy the pictures and see how many you know. I couldn’t take pictures of everything but there is always Wikipedia if you want to expand your knowledge base!

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The grounds of Window of the World were very well done and it was nice to be out wandering around in them. The gardener in me is always looking for inspiration!

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The most fun for me at Window of the World was the ‘Cowboy and Indian’ section, not very politically correct but it did have an archery range. I paid my money for fifteen arrows and with my newfound archery skills challenged Cameron to a shootout. The lady running it had me shoot at a very close target and when she figured out I had done this before she moved me to the targets that were further away. By this time, quite a crowd had gathered to watch a Caucasian woman shoot a bow and arrow. Let’s just say that my new nickname could be Katniss from The Hunger Games and Cameron is no William Tell.

After logging a lot of steps through the park we made our way back to Sea World where we all had a Chinese foot massage. This particular massage involves soaking your feet in a little wooden bucket, a back,/neck/shoulder rub through your clothes, a foot massage followed by warm paraffin wax being painted on your feet. You get to relax in a lazy boy recliner while they work on you. So five of us in the same room with five people massaging your feet…nothing awkward about that! The masseuses asked us questions about who we were and we did manage to convey that we were a family and the birth order of the kids. I can only imagine what they were chatting about while they worked on us.

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Stayed tuned for Part Two of Christmas Vacation!