Robin took this photo of the Kamchatka Peninsula on our flight from Vancouver to Hong Kong. Views like this were the first highlight of our trip.  

The 13-hour flight on Cathay Pacific proved surprisingly bearable, perhaps because we sprung for economy plus seats. On Cathay Pacific these are not just coach seats with a little extra leg room as in the U.S. They are in a separate section of the cabin and are almost like first-class seats on a U.S. domestic flight. We even got different food from the folks in steerage. 

We’re now in the Hong Kong airport awaiting our flight to Beijing. The Internet seems fully available here, but then Hong Kong isn’t really China.