2025

This year started with a weekend trip to Xi'an. Similar to Egypt, seeing something I've always heard about in real life is incredible. This time, it was the terracotta warriors at Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site. The food and the Muslim influence in Xi'an was also cool to experience. 

For Chinese New Year, we flew down to Hanoi, Vietnam, to get on a Ha Long Bay cruise. After the cruise, we spent a few days in Hai Phong. Another time of not realizing so much would be closed for the holiday!

That spring, we decided to check out Macau with some friends. I was on the hunt for authentic Portuguese pastel de nata. Then we walked over the land border back into mainland China before taking a train to Guangzhou to see/eat our way around. A month later, we went to Hong Kong for one of Halie's conferences. So my son and I walked around the city, taking naps in parks and riding ferries. 

In the summer, we flew back to the USA to visit some family. While there, my family went on a Caribbean cruise with stops at Port Canaveral, Dominican Republic, US Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, and the Bahamas.

Back in China, we took another weekend trip up to Nanjing with one of our friends before heading to the Philippines with that same friend. First, some beach time on the island of Boracay. After that, some city time in Manila. 

November had us spending a weekend in Hangzhou before we got to December and a trip back to Thailand. We wanted to show our son all of our past haunts around Bangkok before getting some more hours on the beach near Hua Hin, at Sam Roi Yot.

Our first Christmas (other than one COVID year) not back in the states.