The Great Wall at Mutianyu

New developments stretched for miles

11th June 2013

We headed northeast from Beijing to see the Great Wall at Mutianyu on our friend Danny's advice.  Badaling, closer and to the northwest of Beijing is the more popular, crowded and touristy bit we were told.

So, the plan was to check out of our Beijing hotel and head out to the Great Wall and then return to catch the evening train to Xian.

Turns out that it was the Dragon Boat Festival weekend, and as we hit the highway, there were several others heading out as well!

Our driver, recommended by Danny, knew English, but was not loquacious by any means.  Probably did not want to put his English to the test!

But it was a great help having him as he took us door to door, and also pointed us in the right direction at every step of the way.

We stayed on the Jincheng Expressway, and it felt like forever before we truly left Beijing and entered the countryside.

Suddenly, there was farmland all around

Rolling farmlands growing unrecognisable crops, interspersed with patches of trees, all looking nice and green.

Bohai is the township where Mutianyu village is located.  Reportedly Mutianyu gets tourist income, but the rest of the township is not in great shape.

We arrived at Mutianyu and found that it was raining and the thought of walking up made me rather miserable.  We had toyed with the idea of taking the cablecar up (it meant less time taken) and the weather sealed it.  For 80 RMB a head, we got ourselves cable car tickets.

There are not many pictures of the village because we did not take the cameras out in the incessant drizzle.

The cable car works with super efficiency and cars keep coming and taking visitors up, so there was no real waiting period, and we were up and out in some fifteen twenty minutes, all rather painless and untiring.

A good thing, becuase this is what stretched ahead of us!

Enjoy the pictures

So, here we were, on the Great Wall of China.  Remember the Billy Joel song?

Imagine the Chinese soldiers of old patrolling this, and keeping a nervous eye out for the marauding Mongols.  And now, a happy giggly bunch of tourists walk the ramparts!

The Mutianyu section has been restored as recently as the 1980s, and was also worked on during the Ming dynasty

What a fortune must have been spent on building this and then maintaining troops on it.

The Wall stands right on top of the mountain ridge, and from above, there seems to be miles of forest

We were lucky with the rain and drizzle, which held off when we were atop.  It also cleared the air, and improved our visibility.  A friend of mine said that when she visited, thre was so much mist/fog that they did not have a clear view from above.

We spent a few hours climbing up, and then down the length of this section.  At some places, the steps were steep and treacherous.  I was glad to have negotiated this when my knees were still intact.

It was made of stone in the early days, and then the Mings replaced sections with bricks.

Thrilling and breathtaking.

My only regret was I saw not one bird despite that extensive greenery and forest cover.  I scanned the skies and looked hopefully into the foliage but even the magpies of Beijing were not to be seen.  

Was it the rain?  Was I not looking in the right place?  One blog said that the unrestored bits have more bird life than the restored bits. 

And then just as we decided it was time to go, there was a rumble, and a thunderstorm broke over our heads.  We were at the head of the queue going down in the cablecar, but had to wait for the storm to abate, before they allowed us on.

If you please, we were in this car going down!

A last view from the cablecar

A walk through the only bit of stalls, filled with koala bears, and great wall t shirts

Old Chinese saying:  "You are only a hero when you climb the Great Wall."  I wonder if cablecars qualify!

And then before we knew it, we were back on the expressway.

An Elantra cab!

The driver had a gprs map of the city, with traffic levels on different highways.  So roads that were marked red were heavy with traffic and to be avoided.

I was totally impressed.  He kept changing direction and roads to get us to the station on time. 

Our ride seemed never ending, and we were int he outskirts of the city for what seemed like forever.

Beijing has several stations, and we were headed to Beijing West.  Our cabbie had never been to this station, but he found it with just that electronic map of his, and dropped us at the gate, well in time. 

Read about the station and our travels in Xian, as Sekar writes.