Saturday, April 22, 2006
April 22: Great Wall
This morning, I dragged myself out of bed at the princely hour of 5 AM to get myself together before the trip to the Great Wall at Jinshanling and Simatai. The transport would take us to Jinshanling, and we'd walk along the wall for 10km, to end up at Simatai. The two places are different sections.
From everything I hear, this particular trip is the trip for the actively-minded, not-quite-a-cripple traveller. I don't think I'm a cripple, so this trip was for me. And, I'm happy to say that I was not disappointed.
Random facts about the Great Wall (from memory - so this might be wrong!):
- The earliest section, at Badaling, was built around 200 BC. Badaling was rebuilt by the Ming dynasty around 400 years ago.
- Jinshanling is the most recent section of the wall to be built - also by the Ming dynasty. They have gun turrets suitable for cannons on the Mongolia side of the wall.
- Even if you're going to a fairly non-commercialized section like Jinshanling, you can still expect some entrepreneurial Chinese to try to make a buck by selling you stuff.
Anyway, after breakfast (25 Yuan for a Western-style all-you-can-eat buffet - call it $3.50 CAD) we hopped on a minibus for the 3-hour trip to Jinshanling. Now, somewhere I read that it's only about 120 km away. Why does it take 3 hours? I have no idea. We were on highways most of the time. I think it's only 120km away if you're a helicopter, and Chinese roads don't go straight.
Our driver was typically Chinese in the sense that his driving was "pragmatic" (read: opportunistic). That is to say, he was using the right shoulder as a passing lane on multiple occasions, and at one point drag-raced a big truck that was trying to pass him. All this while talking on his mobile phone.
For the trip, we formed an imprompty group of six, consisting of Denver (from the Philippines), Elisa and Nina (from Holland) and Sofie and Maria (from Denmark). Denver took off to Xi'an in the evening, Elisa and Nina are going back to Holland on Monday, and Sofie & Maria are going to loiter in Beijing for a while longer before heading off on their next destination, whatever that is.
The Wall itself is.... pretty cool. I don't think the Chinese know how to do anything on a small scale. The wall itself is wide, the towers are big etc. The Jinshanling side is a bit more authentic than the Simatai side since less of it is restored. For much of the way you are walking on broken down old stone and there are a few places where you have to get off the wall & walk around since there's no actual way to negotiate a path. It's definitely impressive. Also, Jinshanling wasn't very crowded at all. Plus, we got really lucky with the weather - perfect day for a hike.
When you get to the site, as you begin to go down the trail to the wall, you somehow pick up a tail. This would be an older Chinese man or woman (mine was a Chinese woman, though a few of them said they were Mongolian so maybe she was too). I didn't want to buy anything from her. I decided it'd be fun to wear her out, so I bolted ahead at whatever breakneck pace I could manage (which I think was pretty fast) and at one point the poor woman groaned "sir... not so fast!" Unfortunately, she caught up once I got on the wall and waited for the other 5 in our group. Eventually, she conned me into buying a book about the wall, mostly consisting of photos.
Oh, and there are entrepreneurial types all along the wall (typically old Chinese men & women with their teeth looking sparse) selling water, coke & beer. I'm a little surprised at the beer thing, but maybe that's because I'm used to Canada, where drinking in public is a non-starter. I wouldn't want to drink
The Simatai section of the wall, while I hear it's better than Badaling for crowds & commercialism, disappointed compared to Jinshanling - which is not to say it was bad! However, the crowding was a bit nuts, with groups running around in coloured t-shirts racing up & down the wall or something. Very surreal, and more than a little annoying: "GET OUT OF MY SHOT YOU @#%*@(#%*!(@)*%!)*!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Oh yes, speaking of shots, I shot lots of both film & digital and photos will be up as some point. I need to find a place where I can offload them from my digicam.
So yes, the Wall is awesome, everyone should go.
Tomorrow, I'm off to the Yonghe Dong buddhist monastery, the Confuscian Temple, and the Forbidden City. Then, I'll try to act on the advice of one Robert Madden and visit a place called the Red Capital Club for a drink. Maybe the Long March? Or the Dream of Red Capital? I'm intrigued by these coctails. On Monday night, I'm off on an overnight train to Xi'an.
