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We hired a car from the hotel concierge to take us to the Great Wall Mutianyu about an hour from the hotel. You can take a chair lift to the top of the wall but we decided to walk up the trail and stairs to the top of the wall. We hiked along the wall to the part of the wall where there was a warning sign to stop. We started off pretty early but it got really hot really fast. Luckily there were people selling water along the wall as we walked because we didn't bring enough with us. We took the slide down, which was like a little cart with a hand break. It was a longer ride than we thought and a lot of fun. We made it back to the bottom were our driver easily recognized us as there weren't too many non Chinese people walking around. We spent about 4 hours at the wall. We then stopped at the Olympic Village just long enough to look at the Birds nest and water cube from the outside. The whole Olympic Village was huge and very modern. It took about 10 minutes of walking to get to the
center of it and it seemed so empty even though there were lots of tourists spread out around the buildings. Then it was back to the car for a short trip to a silk factory and then tea house. Our driver didn't speak English so we went where he took us. The silk factory and tea house were an experience even though the driver just brings you there to shop. Once we got back to the hotel we took the subway which was located just below the hotel to the Temple of Heaven. The beijing subway is super easy to use with signs in English. The Temple of Heaven was another temple in another huge park. We walked around it for a bit and then took the subway back to the hotel since we were really tired of walking. We went out for Peking duck which was really good and then took a stroll through the night market where one of the vendors was trying to sell Dave some fried cat.
The next morning we slept in and then took the subway to the summer palace. We got off at the wrong stop and had to take the bus
a few miles down the road. Good thing the bus and subway had their stops in English and Chinese making it pretty easy to navigate. We walked around the sumer palace and took in the sights around the lake. We liked that there were areas in the palace grounds that didn't have so many tourists so we could sit and relax a bit. It was a super smoggy day and it looked dark like it was about to rain. We then had to go back to the hotel to pick up our luggage and catch a flight to Luoyang. We were going to take the overnight train there but the sleeper tickets were all sold out for Wednesday night so we found a travel agent and booked plane tickets which we had to pay for in cash, good thing they weren't too expensive. Flying on Chinese run airlines is an adventure. We had to take a bus from the terminal to the plane which they crammed all the passengers on then it was a free for all to get on the plane. This was the weirdest part since we all had assigned seats and most people didn't carry on their
luggage. The flight was unevenful and we got our luggage easily.
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