Gray skies greet us as we depart Glen Ellyn for Detroit and Beijing. It was a short ride to O'Hare with Fred and Pat.

Light traffic for a Sunday following Thanksgiving, a quick check-in at the airport for the 22 of us from Glen Ellyn, and the Bridge Group is on its way.

Shortly after our arrival in Detroit we boarded a Northwest 747-400 for a 14 hour ride to China. We will be crossing Canada, Alaska, Eastern Russia, Mongolia, and then our descent into Beijing. The sun stayed just ahead of us beneath the horizon. Oh those poor pilots. It's mid afternoon in Beijing with only 8 hours behind us "ha", look down in twilight as we crossed the arctic circle and eastern Russia - wide rivers, snow, trees - and not able to take pictures because of no natural sunlight.

Dinner was served along with drinks and several snacks later in the flight. We added 14 hours to our watches while we viewed several movies and tried to adjust our bodies to Beijing time.

The descent was smooth "Floyd-like" as the very tired, overworked, and underpaid pilot put our 747 softly on the runway at Beijing at 6PM. No jet bridges at Beijing as we were bussed to the custons building where we met our guide and then boarded our tour bus for the hotel. What a long day or was it two?

We rode into the city in our tour bus with our guide Irene. She outlined the upcoming weeks activities and prepared us for the next days tour. She issued the room keys and we settled in for our weeks stay in Beijing.