2009 09 07 – Day 73 – 3 hrs bus north west of Beijing
“
The Great Wall of China; a miracle of Chinese engineering, so big you can see it from anywhere in the world.“ -
Father Ted (
"Are You Right There, Father Ted?").
Thanks to Ben for tickling my brain with this particular piece of comedic genius. I laughed my way along the four hour walk that is the Jinshanling to Simatai section.
For those who'd like to see that I was actually there and placate the enthusiastic middle-aged local Chinese lady who'd decided we were walking buddies. A whole group of them joined us tourists at the point we got on the wall – the men-folk were apparently working the fields. My 'guide' entertained me with her broken English banter for an hour or so, before persuading me to buy a few of her goods. Normally I would have avoided buying, but she'd been so enthusiastic, cheery and not pushy, that I wanted to acknowledge her good attitude as much as anything.
It's quite amazing when you get views like this, with every rise within sight having a tower on it and the wall snaking its way up and down along the ridges between.
Although we had something of a timetable to keep to meet a bus at the other end, I was confident enough of my pace, from counting the number of towers I'd passed and watching the time, to allow myself to fall behind a bit, to enjoy the wall alone and take pictures at my own pace.
Occasionally the sun would find its way through the thin cloud, which looks good, but with the temperature rapidly rising, I'd be glad when the cloud covered it up again.
A fair few of these millipedes were also making the trek, despite some gruesome evidence of the hazards of hiker's feet – at least half of the millipedes I saw were splat flat and stuck to the stone.
At times the wall was incredibly steep, managed at times with steps
and at others with slopes
and in case you didn't notice the slope:
Most times you could go through the towers, and buy water, snacks, postcards or t-shirts from the sole occupant entrepreneurs,
but sometimes you had to go round the side and re-mount the wall
The start of the dramatic descent to Simatai
Much of the wall from here to Simatai was heavily restored and, having been sympathetic to the regularly observed indignation to wholesale restoration from travellers and Lonely Planet, I found my perspective on the issue shifting. I think it's important to leave some sections unrestored, just maintaining them and making them safe to walk, but I did value walking on some distance of restored wall and gaining a better insight to how it might have looked and felt when it was in use. Of course I'm no expert in the nature and implementation of such restoration works and couldn't say that they'd done the job in the most historically sympathetic way or not.
It was along this restored section near Simatai that I passed an enthusiastic German family. Though we were the only people in sight, they tempered their exuberance as we neared, as most people would, and we exchanged polite nods and hellos. I'd hardly walked 20 meters further when the father couldn't hold back any longer and opening his lungs at the wilderness to the north he roared:
“Die Mongolen kommen!!”
Which gave me something else to laugh about for the rest of the day :)
A section in the process of being restored that I couldn't help but think of as a massive skate ramp!
A bit like a roller coaster, no sooner had I come down, than I wanted to go up again!
The Wall climbs dramatically beyond the Simatai exit, which made me want to ascend, but I only had strength and time enough to climb past two or three towers. Besides, you can't get to the top of that section, or at least it's shut off, as it's deemed too dangerous for general access.
All that up and down is tough on the legs and plenty of tourists pay a few RMB more to ride the zip-line down the last section across a little lake
But I quite like walking and so I did that instead.
