Playing hooky (aka Field Trip)

Due to a variety of circumstances, we did not travel back to the US this summer. And it was crazy-hot here in Suzhou. I think we spent well over a month with our temperatures above 100 every. stinking. day. Seriously, beastly hot. We spent a lot of time at the pool, which was a great help. But with our fair skin, we can only be out so long before we start looking lobster-like. So we often would go to the pool for a couple of hours and then we would come home, shower, and school for a bit. Can you believe that we started school at the end of July?

But now that our weather is absolutely beautiful, we are reaping the benefits of starting early. All week I had been pondering taking the day off on Friday. The weather promised to be good so Friday I declared it to be an adventure day and that no school would happen that day. I gave the kids two options at breakfast (a garden or a boat ride), we voted, and set off for exploring.

Since we were going to be taking the bus, we waited a bit to let all the commuters get to work. And then ended up waiting forever at the bus stop for our bus to come. The sign in the background tells how many stops away each bus is. When we got to the stop, it said our bus was 23 stops away. After waiting a couple of minutes with no changes, we realized that it was not working correctly. Though we did have to wait longer than normal, I think that it felt even longer because we are used to counting on the signs. J is making the face not because of the long wait, but due to the fact that I was taking his picture.

Suzhou is famous for its gardens. There are many scattered about the city. Gardens that were once private residences are now for the public to view. In each garden, there are many windows such as this one with various designs on them. I have heard that within the same garden no two windows are the same, so that each one gives you a unique view into the garden.

Another distinction of Suzhou's gardens are the rock formations. They make caves, tunnels, and paths to climb and explore. We went to Lion's Forest Garden (though a smaller garden, it is our personal favorite because it has so many rock formations). I am not sure if we first called them this or if I read about it in a book, but we refer to these formations as rockeries.

Josh and Tori also found seats and perches within the rockeries. J called this one his throne.

Not to be outdone, T also found a throne. Have you noticed her outfit? Though the scarf only made it midway through the day, she was stylin'.

As we walked to the garden, we were scoping out places for lunch. This one was decided upon due to its wagon wheel table and benches. Though I forgot to take a picture, parts of the floor were glass with fish tanks in the floor. I loved that we had a plan of which garden, but other than that, we were going to roll with the day.

My city explorers. Ready and willing to walk (and walk and walk). Each with bag packed for what might be needed. Someday we are going to move back to the US and have a van and drive everywhere and I wonder if we will find it strange or wonderful. But for now, we are public transportation mavens.

I think over the next month or so, we are going to take advantage of our early start and our beautiful weather and do some more exploring of our interesting city.