Go! Go! Go! We have to get out of here!

In August we took a few days off and went to the sea.

Kites, fridge, cat in the car and off we went. From Changchun towards Qinghuangdao and stay where it's nice, always along the water. We had a tent on the roof.

In Qinghuangdao, the Great Wall of China ends in the sea, which we actually wanted to see, but we didn't even get there. We only got as far as the motorway exit. There we had to turn around again, the police wouldn't let us through. We still don't know what their problem really was. But even Chinese people in front of us had to get out of the car, open the trunk and the officers were sniffing in the suitcases...

As foreigners without language skills, it took quite a while before we could explain to the officials that we were going back. With telephone support, however, it worked out and we were given our own guidance vehicle, which guided us across the exit, under the motorway, to the other side of the road. By the way, we had to confirm 3 times that we would not drive away from the pilot ;)

But what we had already seen on the way there: a big, fat traffic jam awaited us. In the sat nav, everything is always nicely coloured red. At the next service station we drove down and stocked up on chocolate, ice cream, coke and other great sugary things. You can't drive into a traffic jam unprepared. So we spent the whole day in the car, only to end up back where we had been for the first few days, on Suizhong beach.

But then we also realised that we already had the best, most beautiful place and the one closest to the water. At what felt like 40° degrees and a real 37.5° in the shade, you really can't move very far away from the water. Even the locals get inventive to make shade for themselves.

There were also beach bungalow settlements. These were containers with a large window, bed, small bathroom and table with chair. Everything was in relatively good shape and well maintained, with a restaurant.

Of course, we also went there for dinner and we two blondies were a bit conspicuous... ;)

We even attracted so much attention that, on the evening when there was a thunderstorm, a staff member from the bungalow village drove to our pitch and invited us into a bungalow. We thanked him, but stayed in the tent, or rather I stayed in the car.

We also had visitors often. And at least once a day, the owner of the site came by to see if we were okay. After we showed him how our translation app worked, he told us that he allowed us to stay here. He would have chased the Chinese away...

By the way, this is the entrance to his house

We couldn't find out exactly what he collects here, even with the translation app.

Overall, the summer was relatively peaceful in terms of corona. We were out and about a lot on the weekends, went kiting when there was wind and explored corners of and around Changchun where we had not been before. In late summer there are a lot of dragonflies here. By the way, the first picture is of rice.

But then Changchun was hit at the beginning of autumn:

Since we already had to stay at home in spring due to the lockdown, we were naturally looking forward to our autumn holidays. It was supposed to start in mid-September and last for about 4 weeks. Almost our entire annual holiday.

Denny was on a business trip to Hefei when I got a call from a friend at the beginning of September. There are cases in Changchun again and everyone is already buying out the supermarkets.

After our experiences in spring, this of course immediately set all alarm bells ringing,

We didn't want to get locked in again and spoil our holiday at any cost.

So I immediately called Denny, he had to come home as soon as possible! Head over heels, we packed our things and left:

Wednesday noon came the call, Thursday late in the evening Denny was back home, Friday our kite luggage went on the journey and the obligatory Covid test had to be done and Saturday morning we were on the plane.

It reads so easy, but it wasn't easy to organise everything from one moment to the next. In the end, we made it and Denny was able to work from the home office on the island for the days we flew earlier.

Only a few days later, we were told by friends that a colleague on a business trip had been stopped at the destination airport. He was asked to decide whether to get back on the plane or go into quarantine for 7 days.

Changchun did not go into lockdown, but not much was missing.

We will report on our holiday on Pingtan in the next blog.

Greetings

Anja & Denny