Beijing,
China
Friday, October 17, 2008
Our tour of the wall was a bit different than that which most people who go to the wall experience. We were 'picked up' by a local while in Tien an men square yesterday who has a tour company. David Wei took us to the (can't remember the name right now, so I'll fill this in later- sent my journal home already!!!It's the portion that Paul Dorotich went to...??) portion of the wall. It is a less touristed area, and further from Beijing. David took one look at us and dicided that he'd take us to an unofficial spot because, as he said, we looked pretty fit. I like this guy David!! We drove for an hour and a half and stopped for breakfast at a little local spot that didn't really look like a restaraunt. We went crazy over the food, it was hot, fresh, and delicious. Simon and Becca loved the deep fried twisted bread that tasted like elephant ears. We drove on a bit more and stopped in a small village at which point we started walking. The only other people we passed were locals who were in the process of some sort of construction project, mostly digging large holes, and moving the rock that they encountered in their digging, lots of rock, big rock!
Our climb to the wall took about an hour. We wound our way up through land that was planted with (again my memory fails me-it's a nut ) trees. We entered the wall through an arch and were met be the rest of the tourists who went up via the tram, from the other direction. Once past the nut trees we never saw another human being. This we loved, and we soaked up the silence.
