Mutianyu Section

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So the morning started early, as most have been here, not having luck sleeping in with the heat here. I had talked with host about directions, but could not find them, so off I went cold turkey. I had gotten a tip online of a good starting point, but it turned out to not be much of a time, but a good way to kill an hour in the Beijing metro. I then found myself at T-square and the office of a "great wall" booking agency for buses going to the many sites of the great wall. From Beijing, there are 3 areas that are popular to go to, and apparently the section I wished to see was number 3 on the list, and only arranged on weekends. So, with no chinese, and very little english on the other side, we managed to find me a metro station and a bus that would take me to the site. After that, things fell into place. There was even a german couple on the bus to share a taxi with to the site. I walked the 600 metres from the bottom of the site to the wall, and was greeted with a fantastic view of a wall that stretched from hill top to hill top. I did not bother reading how many km this section stretched, but I walked it from "No tourist access" to "No tourist access". In all I spent about 3 hours touring the site and was very greatful I had MP in april as a training ground for the steep elevation of the steps. At one end, the steepest part of all the section, there was not a soul but me and a guard (to make sure I did not access the no access zone), so a nice feeling of silence from a great height. By that time I was beat, so I cheated and took a cable car down, then made my way to the bus and was home by 6. This place was the focus of my trip to china, and it did not disappoint me one bit. It is an amazing stretch and the mind is sparked by how it was achieved.

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