Sunday 21st October 2012 - Day 18 - Beijing

Once again no lay in for us. 6.30am alarm call and showered, breakfast, changed up dollars to yuan and met the others with rain coat in hand at 8 o’clock on the dot. We had an hour and a half travel to the Badaling section of the great wall of china. This is the closest to the city and therefore the most touristy. We arrived along with coach loads of others and started out on the wall where we had 2 hours to explore. We had two possible choices to either go right with the majority of the crowd of go left with less people, we chose left. Its true there were less people but it was the steepest section.

 

The wall has been extensively restored and in the steepest sections there was a handrail which was definitely needed. There were several elderly people with walking sticks being pushed and pulled up and down, if they can do it so can we! We climbed as quickly as possible to make sure we got as far as possible in the time slot. As we got higher and higher the crowds started to deplete and at the very top where you could not go any further there was merely a handful of others around. You could see past where we were allowed and the wall was definitely in a worse condition. It was very misty up in the clouds but at least the rain held off while we were on the wall.      

 

Our guide book says that October is the best time of year to visit as the colours of the trees around are very autumnal and they were. All in all the wall was everything we expected and more. It was awesome and it amazed us as everybody on there was smiling. It is one of the 7 wonders of the world and lives up to the title. We are very excited to be revisiting the wall in a less touristy place on a weekday in two days time and we will have longer time there and we have been guaranteed there will be less people.

 

After a quick coffee we went to lunch in a jade carving factory where we saw masters carving jade balls with smaller balls inside very clever and it was nice but we just really wanted to get on the road to the Ming Tomb. We arrived there and stood in the rain while Yan explained that the 13 emperors of the Ming Dynasty are buried here in the tombs. Only one has been excavated and we went underground to see the coffins and the thrones of the emperor and empress’s. It was good to see but to be honest it was not decorated or anywhere near as ornate as other places we have visited recently. There was a white stone above ground that had directed the excavators to the right place. We also walked through a gate leading to heaven and on the way back through we had to shout ‘I’m Back!’

 

From here we sat in traffic for a good hour before jumping out in the rain for a quick run over the bridge to photograph the Olympic site including the bubble swimming pool and birds nest stadium. It’s a shame it was chucking it down and getting dark as it would have been nice to spend a bit longer looking around the Olympic sites. We got dropped off at the Silk Market and was surprised to see it was more of a shopping mall. We did a bit of haggling and had a bit of a wander but did not stay long. We went in search of dinner and came across the I food restaurant which was like a clean sanctuary in amongst the chaos. We enjoyed ordering our own food and got wifi for the first time although we are blocked from both the blog site and facebook!

 

We bartered with a few taxi drivers and managed to get it for less than half price and it was worth paying seeing as we had worked out it was an hour walk in the cold and rain in the dark and that’s without getting lost! Back at the hotel we changed up more dollars and got some cash out too. Today is the last day we are spending with the Go Russia tour company, from now on we are on our own but don’t worry about us, we have the Chinese language cracked! The next week or so should be fun! We can say hello, thank you and I can nearly count to ten. Also no more 4 star hotels more like no star hostels.