The Village, Water Cube and Night Views

Sorry to have disappointed my fans with my lack of blogging, but we have been on the go so much that I have been completely exhausted. I was so tired yesterday that I wanted to just sit in the corner and cry, instead I slept for nearly 12 hours last night and then took a nap this afternoon. I am feeling MUCH better now and so we can get back to the regular scheduled programming of blogging my adventures.

Yesterday Erik competed in the 200m semi-finals. He once again had a good race, but these guys here are crazy fast so he didn't quite make it to the finals. There is a Chinese guy here that nobody has seen before, but has broken the World Record in every event that he has raced in. He is absolutely amazing! Erik seemed pretty bummed, but is focusing his attention on his upcoming 100m and 4x400m relay.



After the races we headed over to check out the Paralympic Village. We had quite the adventure in the taxi trying to find the correct entrance to the village. Nobody understood where we were wanting to go and with the language barrier it can get pretty frustrating. Luckily we had a taxi driver that was patient with us and we were all cracking up laughing. After getting Aunt Sunny on the phone multiple times to speak to the driver and police and after asking many volunteers we FINALLY found it and we had a wonderful time.




Here is where the athletes stay in the village. After the Paralympics are over they will be converted into apartments and be sold off.







After visiting the Village, we were heading over to the Water Cube to watch some swimming. When we walked out we were trying to get a taxi when Collin (below in red) told us that it was only a 5 maybe a 10 minute walk to the cube so we decided to walk. Over 1 HOUR and a few blisters later we finally made it to the Water Cube. It was worth the walk because the Cube was amazing inside. We watched a little swimming and then walked around to get some beautiful night pictures.








After coming out of the Water Cube we were leisurely walking and enjoying the beautiful surroundings when, with no warning at all, water started coming out of the ground. Luckily I was able to move and not get my camera wet, but Troy was not so lucky. After he got wet he decided to just have fun with it and wheel through the water. Yep, Troy and a ton of little 5 year-olds played in the water. It made me miss my kids even more because they would have had a ton of fun with Troy.





I am headed home in the morning. I will be sad to leave Beijing, but I can't wait to see my kids. I miss them like crazy. I am ready to sit and cuddle with for sure. 10 days is too long to be away from them. I will get updates from Troy on Erik's upcoming races since he is staying for a few more days so I will let you all know how he does! Thanks for keeping up with my adventures in Beijing!