Slapped by a Monkey

Today I got slapped by a monkey...twice! It's the first day of our vacation.  We got here in Zhangjiajie at about in the morning.  We checked into our hostel which is way nice and just like a hotel.  We got ready, ate some lunch at a near by Chinese restaurant and headed to the National Park.  Cynthia wasn't feeling well so she stayed at the hostel all day. The bus ride there took about 40 minutes. After we got there we bought tickets to get into the National forest. We got in and took some group pictures by the big opening rock.

We walked a little bit and had another shorter bus ride to the place we were touring.  The bus was full of old cute people.  They tried to talk to us but we couldn't understand... dang language barrier.  But I told them "Wo ai jung gua!" which means I love China, minus the spelling. We then had to purchase tickets for the cable car. money money money!! The cable care was Awesome! It was about a 3 minute ride up to the top of the mountain.  They were fancy and the floor was made out of glass so we could look down at the amazingly beautiful view.

When we got to the top there were these wild monkey just walking around on fence posts.  It was so cool and of course we had to take pictures with them. A few girls took their pictures then it was my turn. I took a smiling picture then I said "okay Britta, take pictures!" I stayed looking at the camera and began moving my hand towards the monkey like I was about to touch it. As I was posing for the picture the monkey slapped me! I was so shocked! I just though to myself "what the heck" so I stuck out my hand again and it slapped me again.  So then I ran away. Haha we got a good laugh out of it for sure. Sad thing is we didn't get a picture of his slapping me, but this is cool too.

 We thought they were so cool but they were little devil monkeys.

This baby monkey was so stinken cute though.

We walked some more and some people asked to take pictures with us and stuff... you know, the usual. After hiking for a while we came to an open area where some older people were singing in Chinese. It was cool to watch.  I sat there and listened to them with a huge smile on my face. One guy took off his hat and jokingly asked people for money.  I laughed at him and he saw so he pointed at be and laughed too. A few minutes later all the people were telling me to come sing with them, so I did. I don't speak Chinese so I just sang "I don't know the words" and moved my hands all dramatically.  They loved it. I sang with them until the end of the song.  Afterwards they all hugged me and took pictures with me.  It was definitely the highlight of the whole trip.

Just some pictures of the beautiful view and beautiful people hehe!

We headed down the mountain on foot; it was about an hour and a half of pure stairs! At least it was down hill! Once we got to the bottom we looked at some souvenirs.  I bought a Buddha ring.  We then took the bus back to the hostel.  We got some food and then went to McDonalds for some hot coco.  We went back to the hostel and took amazing hot showers.  This was the best shower I have had for three months! It was warm, clean, and I didn't have to hold the shower head 24/7.

After our showers Cynthia and Miranda came into me and Amanda's room and played cards with us.  It was lots of fun.  After we played for a while I started a pillow fight with the girls.  It was thee greatest thing, I like beating people up. I then braided their hair and we went to bed.