the Eastern Beginning of the Great Wall-Hushan Great Wall

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I went to the Eastern Beginning of the Great Wall on Oct. 3 of 2012. Hushan - 'Tiger Mountain' in English, is so named because the two towering peaks are like two tiger ears pricking up into the sky. It covers an area of four square kilometers (1.54 square miles) and its main peak measures 146.3 meters (1,080 feet). In history, the mountain was always regarded as an important fortress because it guarded the safety of Dandong City in Liaoning Provience and is the eastern gate way to China. So logic dictated that a section of Great Wall along Hushan Mountain be built to take up the commanding heights.The Hushan Great Wall, lying on the Yalu River, 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Dandong City, Liaoning Province, and facing North Korea across the river, was built to strengthen the frontier defense in the Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644) and was the eastern starting point of the ten thousand li Great Wall. However, due to the collapse of many parts of its structure, people took Shanhaiguan Pass to be the eastern-most point of the Great Wall. The excavation of 600-meters (0.4 miles) of ruins in 1989 proved it to be the real one. In 1992, the government invested a huge amount of money to restore this section. The renovation of 1,000 meters (0.6 miles) of the principal part was completed in 2000.Now the newly-restored Hushan Great Wall is becoming a hot tourist attraction in Dandong. Climbing onto the top steps, you will have a grand view of the beautiful scenery of China and North Korea. Scanning widely, you can even see the mist-covered Yellow Sea in the distance.

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