This June we have been hosting company here in China almost constantly.  At the beginning of the summer my grandparents came for Michael’s graduation and to visit China, and the day they left we picked up our friends, the Vander Arks, from the airport!  So it has been a pretty busy, but fun, summer.   In this blog I’ll summarize our visit with our special friends from Washington DC, the Vander Arks.  One of their goals was to see Tianjin, and get a picture of our lives here for a bit.  After almost two weeks together in Tianjin, we went to Beijing to sight see.  From there Rachel and I went to Guilin with their family to be “tour guides”.  I was really excited to visit Guilin, this being my second time there.  The scenery in Gulin, a city in the south of China, is breathtaking and the activities are limitless.  While in Guilin an adventure education company named China Climb brought us rock climbing, biking, kayaking, cooking, caving, swimming, and hiking!  It was a ton of fun, but a bit difficult.  These were all great ways to experience the beauty of the south of China as well as the culture. 

My favorite activity was kayaking.  At the beginning I was having a hard time trying to paddle with my cast, but later I really enjoyed it because the water was moving so slowly that we could leisurely paddle along or just float down the river and take a dip when we’re hot.  It was so relaxing and a lot of fun!  Over all I had a great time in Guilin and am very thankful for the opportunity to go with the Vander Arks!