The Great Wall of China

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Yesterday I left my hotel at six in the morning to head to the Great Wall of China. There's a part of the wall that's relatively close to Beijing called Badaling but I heard that it's the mother of all tourist sites- packed with people, and it was also fixed somewhat recently so it wouldn't feel like a genuine experience.

I decided to take a bus to Jinshanling- which is about a three hour bus ride from Beijing- and hike between there and Simatai. It's about a four hour hike between the two points.

The wall was first built between the 5th century BC and 220 AD. During the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) a lot of the smaller walls were joined together and rebuilt and make up the wall that exists today. The wall
stretches across 6,700km of land and was built mostly along the northern divide between China and Mongolia. To put that into perspective, there are 6,700 kilometers between Fredericton, New Brunswick and Whitehorse in the Yukon (if you're rusty on your Canadian geography, you can check out a map here.)

Before I left Canada, someone mentioned to me that there was a "Great Wall" marathon in China every year, so I had a picture of a somewhat flat surface in my mind. This lovely idea was shattered quickly on the bus ride there. I sat beside an Austrian girl who enjoyed talking more than breathing. On top of giving me an in-depth history of the wall, she showed me photos of the area we would be "hiking". At some points, it appeared that we really would be climbing the wall- straight up on a 90 degree angle.

The hike started off easy, but quickly became very steep- we tackled huge climbs as well as some tricky declines. There were lots of parts that had crumbled and areas where huge chunks had just fallen off the side of the wall. Several times I lost my footing and came close to falling right off. We were lucky to be there on a sunny day- I read that when it rains it's extremely slippery up there.

Hiking the wall was almost a spiritual experience. It's so beautiful and peaceful out there- we were surrounded by mountains, green fields, trees and lakes- and the wall stretched on for as far as we could see. It was hard to believe that we were walking on something so old. I can't imagine the amount of work that went into building it. I read that little is known about the original construction force, but during the rebuild of the wall in the Ming Dynasty- the effort was taken on by soldiers, along with civilian labourers, artisans and craftsmen. These were specialized workers who probably spent their entire careers building. Parts of the wall required workforces of a few hudred thousand, and others needed more than a million people!

At the end of the hike, we had the option to ride a zipline (a cable suspended pulley). Visitors can pay six dollars Canadian to glide at the speed of light for half a kilometer over a crystal green lake, strapped in with only a flimsy harness. The equipment did not look very new.

I hiked the whole way with a Norweigan girl named Lisa who was afraid of heights (which was pretty funny considering where we were.) We decided to give the zipline a try. We were positive that it was going to break half way and we'd plunge hundreds of feet into the lake to our deaths but luckily, the cable held strong and we floated to the other side without a scratch.

It was a great way to end my experience in China- today I fly to Hanoi, Vietam to meet Ryan. I'm so excited!

Before I leave for my flight I'm going for a "blind man" massage. Supposedly blind people have a special sense when it comes to touch and healing. This type of massage is linked to traditional Chinese medicine. I guess they can feel where you're holding tension and the sources of different problems within your body and heal them through touch. Lisa went a few days ago and she said that the blind person's hands were incredibly hot, like they had heating pads on. After three weeks of carrying a 20 kilo backpack, I'm really looking forward to it.

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