An over night visit to the Great Wall of China

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After my short visit to Mongolia in June 2012 en route to Singapore, I decided to stay a night in Beijing. I have been to Beijing many times before for business trip and regretted that I never took the time off to visit the city as a tourist.

I am lucky to have a colleague who is able to help me arranging a transportation picking me up from the airport and sent me to the Commune by the Great Wall (www.communebythegreatwall.com/en). I had read about this uniquely designed hotel situated next to the Great Wall. Its website describes: it is a collection of a private collection of contemporary architecture designed by 12 Asian architects. Some of the unique designs were Bamboo Wall, Suitcase House and Cantilever House.

Upon checked in, I got a wow feeling just by looking at the resort’s design. It’s a modern and zen concept surrounded by nature. Each villas, quite a distance from each other, consists of several rooms with a common area inside. Each room was more like a suite as it has a living room and balcony. It’s new and spacious and feels fresh. I had enjoyed walking from the lobby towards my villas as I had the chance to enjoy the beauty of its nature (the hotel provides shuttle services from the lobby to each villas). My room was in the villa that is located next to the heated pool. The pool side restaurants has a BBQ dinner where I had mine; unfortunately, when I was there, one of the local companies must have held an offsite where they brought tons of employee flooding the area. The staff didn’t seem to be trained well either (you could hear the noise of dish washing from the kitchen) and were not able to converse in English.

What’s interesting about this property is that it provides a private path onside which leads to a non-restored section of the Great Wall of China. The following morning, I woke up early and after breakfast started my hike to the Great Wall. There was no clear direction to get to the path so I had to check my way around and finally found a narrow path that led to the wall. I had to hike up on a slippery path for about half an hour to reach an entry at the wall. Along the way, I wandered if it was the right way as I -- among the trees - didn’t see anyone along the way. I was relieved to hear Chinese spoken conversation in the distance as I knew I’d reached the entry to the wall (phew).

Reaching the top, I was speechless to see the spectacular view of the wall - the yellowish wall among the lush green on the curvy hills looked outstanding from a distance. I hardly saw anyone at this site but could see the crowds in a distance near the official gate at Badaling. I was glad that I made a decision to go to the non-restored part of the wall; had I gone to the official entrance at Badaling, I’d have a different experience and view of the wall. Being there, I could not help imagining the number of people required to build this wall (how on earth they carry all the stones to the top of the mountain?), not to mention the victims who lost their life in the process.

Returning back to the hotel, I had a chance to have a spa after my lunch before my driver picked me up again and sent me the airport. Do I want to visit other parts of the wall? you bet, it would be interesting to visit other entry points of the 6.2km wall!

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