Advertisement
Published: November 12th 2005
Edit Blog Post
Great Wall at Mutianyu
From the east the Great Wall is trailing the ridges toward Mutianyu. The best trip I did in China so far was to the Great Wall at Mutianyu. Starting from Beijing there are several possibilities to visit the Great Wall. And everybody will tell you another spot which is the most beautiful, the most remote, has the least tourists, is restored in the most original way, is by far the cheapest, features the 'Secret Wall', and so on. Especially the touts in Bejing selling all inclusive tours are very imaginative in praising their spot. And all the other tourist I met where quite certain that the place they had visited is the best.
So am I! And here is why: I wanted to see a section of the Great Wall that had at least partly been restored. When you've had a picture in your mind from the age of a child on, seeing only ruins I thought would be disappointing for me. Unfortunately there are only two places where the Great Wall has been restored to its original form, at Badaling and at Mutianyu. And this is where all the tourists go. To Badaling there are dozens of tours and special tourist buses. I heared that they even set up a Chinese Opera
Unrestored Section
Where the Great Wall has not been restored it is thickly overgrown by bushes and trees. in front of the gate. Mutianyu is a bit less popular because it's further away from Beijing. Off season the tour buses are only running at the weekend. The season lasts until mid of October and it was Tuesday. So that's the place to go! But how to get there, with no tourist buses running? A 'Let's Go' guide book I found in my hostel was very helpful with the planning details.
I got up at five in the morning. But the rice poridge and the dumplings from the food stall in front of the hostel were already steaming. After breakfast I tool the subway to some bus station north of Beijing where I got a bus to the northern outskirts. Lots of school kids on the bus had fun with the foreigner on the bus. One times changing the bus and briefly after opening, no tourists at all, I arrived at the wall. More precisely at the mountains where the wall is up at the ridge. Lazy people can use a chair lift all other face the more than eight hundred steps... I could feel it in my legs the next day. But was mor than rewarding. As soon
Restored Part
At Mutianyu about three kilometers of the wall have been restored to its original form. as you are on top of the wall you have a great view along it. You can see it trailing the ridge from watch tower to watch tower and from one mountai to the next. All this surounded by dense forrest with the colors of autumn and fir and pine trees.
And then I started walking the mighty stones, up and down, from tower to tower, Mongolia to the left and China to the right. The scenery was just wunderfull. At the end of the offical section after some severe warning signs of people falling down some cliff you can see the unrestored form of the wall. I continued on a narrow pathway through trees and copse for some time.
The restored section of the wall in Mutianyu is about three kilometers. Walking this part plus some wild part back and forth plus an unauthorized excursion into Mongolia on a wooden ladder some Mongolian worrior had forgotten to take home I easily spent the whole day. With very tired feed I allowed myself to skip the stairway for returning down and used an outrages expensive tourist slide. It was great fun and really fast!
Down at the parking lot I
Watchtower
In Mutianyu there are two different kind of watchtowers. The one this picture is of basic square shape with a flat roof. Notice the steep ascend of the wall towards the tower. was lucky and escaped all the taxi drivers for a group of chinese students who gave me a lift back to Beijing.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.053s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 7; qc: 24; dbt: 0.0347s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb