Beijing Day 2 - Great Wall & Birds Nest

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September 16th 2009

Published: September 17th 2009

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Rusty Broon

jinshanling-map-l

Dear All

Please forgive me guys, Anne was suppose to write this one tonight but she is currently unavailable (sleeping). This travelblog stuff is my new favourite internet activity, my old favourite is out the window now we are in such close proximity to one another (ha ha, only joking)!!

Today we got up and away early and took a taxi to the Jinshanling section of the Great Wall. Taxi took about 2 hours and nearly killed us 3x - i was sitting in the front so this upped the fear factor by 10! We shared the taxi with a well lovely couple, Ian and Anja - Ian is from Partick and Anja from Germany. Unbelievable, the first people we bump into live about 5 miles away, crazy.

We walked (hiked) from the Jinshanling section to the Simatai Reservour (see map). A 10 km walk over some Great Wall. It was an absolute privilege to do so - the scenary was breathtaking and the wall itself is out of the world, the shear length, size and quality is just suuuuperb - 100/10 a total must. The walk must have took us about 4 hours and was totally knackering!!

beijing day 2 003

I must haven taken about 230 photos, please see attached a few of the good ones. Some of the wall has been rebuilt to its former glory, some left au natural - to be honest the untouch stuff was better, more character and more exciting (must have nearly went on my bum about 4 times).

On the way back, i fell asleep in the taxi and was rudely interupted by another near death experience the driver was beeping at a lorry that was cutting across him as he was overtaking, and he was also heading for a head on collision - crazy a$$ed taxi driver!!

We then stopped off at the National Stadium, which was the Olympic stadium (birds nest) the smog was terrible so photo's were pretty poor!! Pollution here is pretty bad so much to say that you never quite see the proper light of day!

We then got back, had showers and went for a sumptious feast with Ian and Anja - who are excellent with the chopsticks by the way. Then they headed for a train to (i could be wrong) to Datong i think, then onto Shanghai.

Take care, missing