Beijing – Great Wall of China
Wow! Everyone has heard about it, and most people have seen pictures, but there is absolutely nothing that could prepare you for actually seeing it.
The Great Wall is truly amazing, not only given its scale, but where they managed to build it. While we were only able to see a small fraction of it (we walked about two or three miles of its 3,100+ mile length), even through the thick haze coming from Beijing, you could see it snake up and over the ridge in both directions off into the distance. This was one of the must see things of our trip and it definitely lived up to our expectations. Ang has rated it one of her top 20 days of all time (which is quite a statement since she has lived with me for so many days).
Now for the details. Despite the best laid plans, we of course didn’t get out of the hotel until after 10. We spent a bit of time finalizing our transport from Beijing to Xian (overnight train on the 21st), some more time finding a bank machine (hardly anyone outside of major hotels takes credit cards), and then some more time finding a store that sold art supplies so we could get some paper and charcoal. With all that complete, we hopped in a cab, somehow managed to tell the driver where we were going and negotiated a price and set off for the Mutianyu section of the wall (this was a compromise between the heavily touristed section at Badaling that we wanted to avoid, and the more remote section at Simatai that we initially planned on going to. The guide book we have said it was a good option and aside from some trinket booths wasn’t that busy.
About an hour later we pulled into the little town of Mutianyu where it became immediately clear that someone else has the same book we do. Several levels of parking lots were full of cabs from the city and tour buses and people were streaming up the road towards the wall. At this point, we were already committed so we headed off for the ticket booth. From where we arrived, the wall itself is way up on a ridge. There is a hiking trail about a mile long apparently, but for people like us, they have a couple of trams going up to the top. Once you get off, there is a pretty thick crowd of people, but it thins out fairly quickly as you start walking, particularly in places where it gets very steep. We took a whole lot of pictures that show the scale far better than I could ever describe it, suffice it to say the wall is very, very big. Given the point in history when it was built and the lack of any kind of machinery, it is incredible how people and pack animals could have carted all the materials up steep mountainsides and assembled such a project.
Being many hundreds of years old, the wall itself is fairly worn, with the more visited areas having been maintained and restored. A mile or so off in the distance, the serviced part ends so we decided to head that way to see an original piece. The last maintained tower at Mutianyu is at the top of a set of about 600 stairs. Bravado won out over common sense and we headed up, taking a number of breaks to keep from having a heart attack (according to our book they actually run a marathon on the wall each year and while I stood gasping for breath at step 450, I had to wonder who is crazy enough to run it). The challenge was worth it though as the view from the tower was outstanding and seeing an older part of the wall very cool. There was also a skinny little security guard up there to make sure you didn’t go any further, and you had to respect that as part of his job everyday he had to make that same climb. Maybe he’s one of the people in good enough shape to run the marathon.
Our transport down from the wall was in the opposite direction for where we started so we backtracked to the cable car drop and then walked about another half mile to the next station. There is another cable car to take back down to the little town but we opted instead for the toboggan run. This set up is a steel channel similar to a small bobsled track. You sit on a little sled with wheels and a control stick (push forward to speed up, pull back to stop) and head down, As cheesy as the whole things sounds, it was very fun and we managed to keep the video camera running (they say no pictures) and use it as a "tobaggan-cam".
Our day ended fairly uneventfully with a bit of time at a market and dinner. We have seen most of the things we set out to in Beijing, so with two more days here, we’re going to slow things down a little and relax. On the menu for today are some shops we want to see around town and maybe the last sight on our list, the Temple of Heaven. While we have good internet access, we are also trying to upload our pictures diligently, so for anyone interested, the whole collection from our China trip can be seen at: http://www.casaroberts.com/gallery/Chad-China. We haven’t gotten around to writing anything under them to describe what they are and there are a whole lot of images of the kids’ Webkinz in China, but otherwise hopefully what is there gives you a sense of what we are seeing.