China Day 10: Zoo, Shopping, and More Downtime

Today was another day with no official appointments.  We spent the morning at the Guangzhou Zoo, where we hoped to see the giant pandas (they have two).  They were there, but they were inside their air conditioned home behind smoky glass.  We did get to see giraffes, rhinos, leopards, red pandas, and several lions.  They had two male lions a few cages apart, and they got into a roaring match while we were nearby.  Definitely the highlight of the zoo.  We take that back... the highlight was sitting in the concession area eating ice cream after sweating like crazy all morning.  :-)

After lunch and a nap we decided to take a taxi to Shamian Island to do some shopping.  Our travel group is going there Wednesday, but we wanted to get a head start on gifts.  A famous restaurant on the island is Lucy's, which we skipped in 2012.  It's American cuisine and actually pretty good!  Having crinkle-cut french fries and actual ketchup was really nice.  We taxied back to the hotel, and  Heather gave Lucille a bath while Ella and Steve went for a swim.

Lucille was really open again throughout the day and she can be so silly!  We were calling her our tough nut to crack.  Ella told us tonight that she thinks "we cracked her".  She likes to repeat things we say and put "hi-yah!" at the end.  All evening long we got "no hi-yah!", "uh oh hi-yah", "hello hiyah", etc.  She seems to have a great sense of humor so she'll fit right in at home.  Just before bed she fell and bumped her lip, but she went right to Heather for comfort.  This is a great sign of attachment!  She's also been interacting with Steve a lot more.  Please continue to pray for her little heart.  We know she has a long ways to go, but we're so grateful to God for the breakthroughs we continue to see each day.

We're only three more sleeps until we begin the long journey home!!!