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Today was 4th of July and of course being in China it didn't seem much like a holiday. But, it was a pretty awesome alternative to be able to journey to see the Great Wall of China. We took a bus from the city to the Badaling Gate of the Great Wall of China about 90 minutes outside the city.
On the way to the Great Wall we stopped at the Jade Factory to take a tour and to have a shopping opportunity. It really seems like the prices listed are just for fun because if you work with the sales person you can haggle down. Some of the travel participants are better at it than others. I found a pair of earrings and I was able to get them for less than half off the ticket price. I am a tough bargainer and of course the willingness to walk away is always helpful. I was able to purchase a pair of earrings for less than half the ticket price. I used the walk away strategy combined with "tai gui le" which means too expensive. Of course at one point I was asking to drop the price from 2000 Yuan
Matt and Buddha
Matt had to rub Buddha's tummy as we remembered Stephanie and her good luck "belly" sign.to 1500 Yuan and when they said "No" Matthew added "What about 1600?" which really did not help my case.
Lucy was working on trying to get a pendant priced at 300 US dollars for 100 US dollars which was just too steep a bargain for them to handle. Needless to say she didn't get the purchase.
We boarded the bus to enter the Badaling Gate, the most popular entrance spot to the Great Wall. The wall itself took 1000+ years to build and if you died while building it they just buried you in the wall. We decided they were following NCLB, no Chinese left behind and of course they worked on a "block" schedule to complete the wall..lol
We took a cable car to the top of the wall, the fastest and easiest way to see the views. I think Matthew wanted to climb it but once at the top the view was the same. It is truly an amazing human engineering marvel that they could build such a huge structure, so steep and across the whole country....in the mountains. We wondered what the people did to the emperor to be assigned wall duty.
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Ita getting ready to take the cable car to the top of the Great Wall.
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lynette
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beach
well, i think our trip to the beach was just as exciting as the Great Wall!! haha... Hopefully Monica is readjusted to life without a 6 and 4 year old!!