We arrive in Guangzhou

Look at all that cash!! It's a lot less than it looks like but made us feel like we'd won the lottery. Ha! Ha!

The lobby of the White Swan Hotel has a waterfall in it. It was a very nice hotel and close to most of the things we needed during our two week stay.

The view from our window overlooking Guangzhou.

We got up at 3:15am this morning so we could have our bags outside our door by 4:00am. We had an early morning flight to Guangzhou, Guangdong Province where we will meet Charlotte tomorrow. Our flight was only 3 hours which was nice and the entertainment system worked!! Yahoo! We flew with two other families who were also with Great Wall China Adoption and getting their children in Guangdong Province. Our hotel, The White Swan, is famous with the adoption crowd as there is a red couch that everyone takes a photo on when they get their children. It's located on Shamian Island...which is really connected to the main land on one side. It sticks out like a finger with one side only separated from the mainland by a large canal. The Pearl River which is quite large is on its other side. You can walk around the entire island in about 15 to 20 minutes. It was really beautiful with lush landscapes and parks, lots of bronze statues, cute restaurants (Subway and Starbucks) and shops catering to westerners and lots of old western architecture (it was the location of many western embassies during the Opium War). We had to convert some money into Yuan to pay our orphanage and Chinese government fees tomorrow and we had a huge stack!! The conversion rate is about $14 US to $100 Chinese Yuan. We are so excited to finally meet Charlotte tomorrow.