Flying to Beijing

October 21, 2009. We are now flying from Xian to Beijing. The flight is over mountainous regions, where a few things really stand out to me. First is that every mountain side that is not too high in elevation for farming is being farmed. Only the much higher elevations are left alone. Second is that there has not been a single moment of the flight where I have not been able to see areas populated to some degree. Third is that every river that can be dammed is dammed. Now that we are over the planes, I find the lay out of the land very interesting. There are like mini-cities separated by large filed areas. I suggest looking at the area about 2/3 of the way between Xian and Beijing (heading to Beijing) on Google Earth, if you find things like that interesting. I can now tell that we are getting closer to Beijing because the Smog seems to be getting thicker.