ah, home sweet home. after a 13 hour flight from hong kong to chicago, a 4 hour layover, a 2 hour flight to dulles airport and a 1 hour bus ride home, i arrived back at my apartment in dc at about 11pm DC time. petting and kissing my kitties (peanut and penny) was my first order of business. then, let the jet lag begin. it's 2 days later now and i'm starting to get back on track. i went to sleep at 8pm last night and woke up at 3am this morning.

i'm all unpacked, the laundry is almost complete and i'm ready to start painting again. i have a notebook FULL of ideas that i didn't have time to create while in china. and now that i'm at my studio, i can paint on large canvas again. yeah!

please mark your calendars for August 16th....this is the opening night for my "Made in China" exhibit at Long View Gallery here in DC. i'll be sending out an official announcement in the upcoming couple of days. in the meantime, you can see a bit more information and all of my paintings on my website:
www.danaellyn.com

wow. this is it. my last post from china. three weeks zipped by faster than i could have ever imagined. tonight, i sit here in hong kong a with few bottles of wine in my system. it's been a fun day and an indescribably wonderful journey. i have countless photos yet to be posted and priceless stories yet to tell. but, for now i leave you with the handful of paintings and drawings i created here in hong kong. signing off for now until i return to my idilic life back in dc. there's no place like home....

this afternoon i will fly to hong kong for the last leg of the trip. this morning i'll be on a boat for a few hours traveling down the Li river here in Guilin. it is beautiful here - the mountains are like none other....i can't wait to to float down the river and take in the scenery.

Pandas!

yesterday, i visited the Terra Cotta Army in Xi'an. i spoke to some people who had been there years ago and it was fascinating to hear about how much they have modernized the experience. for example, it used to be dirt roads leading to the excavation site but now they are paved and lined with shops.

i'm back on dry land! after 5 days of floating down the yangtze river on the "Princess Jeannie", i'm now in a hotel the city of Xi'an. along the river, we stopped in to several cities for 1/2 day shore excursions. one of the highlights was taking a side trip down a smaller river on 'peapod' boats. these are rickety boats which are rowed by a crew of 6 scantily clad men. at one point in the trip, they get out of the boat and drag the boat by hand with heavy ropes threw the narrow quick flowing passage. here are a few sites from that adventure:





on the first day on the yangtze, we visited the Three Gorges Dam project. wow. wow. and another wow. i highly recommend learning more about it - if you don't already know. i don't have time to get in to the details but let's say for now that it is frighteningly huge, an amazing wonder of technology and a potential catastrophic disaster. let's leave it at that for now and show a few pics:

it's friday morning, china time. this afternoon i'll be boarding a boat for a 5 day journey down the yangtze river. i'm not sure whether or not i will have internet access. that would be a bummer. but....when i get back online i'll have tons of news and images to share from the stretch of days away. stay tuned!

first thing this morning i had the chance to venture out in to the local neighborhood in Shanghai. we came across a familiar sounding store, "Wu Mart". no official relation to Wal Mart but totally the same concept. it was wonderful to get out and go to a local store with not another tourist/westerner in sight. i picked up some art supplies, a great tshirt and some local wine. here are the 4 paintings i created today. i'm started to get really psyched for my "Made in China" exhibit back in DC in August where i'll exhibit all of these paintings. for now, everyone can preview them online. enjoy!

Wu Mart Shopper






Drunk MOnk





Bound Foot Birthday Party





Shanghai Acrobat

after visiting the Great Wall of China, we made a stop at the Ming Tombs - the mausoleums of 13 emperors of the Ming Dynasty. this inspired me to set off on a new little series of paintings and drawings about the emperors. here are the first two that i completed last night:

Emperor Pu Yi:



Shi Kefa (official in the Ming Dynasty):

today.....The Great Wall of China. indeed, it is great. and steep. we trekked to the farthest point they allow tourists to walk. it was invigorating to say the very least. it was raining so unfortunately the photos are not all they could be.....but the memory will vividly live in my mind forever.





this "no visitors" sign marks the end of the line....it is the point at which you can walk no further on the Great Wall at this portion of the wall. Chairman Mao would be proud.