Today we visit the Great Wall of China!

The Great Wall of China is 6300km long (or 10,000 lee using ancient Chinese measurement). The section we are visiting is 76km from Beijing and is the Mutianyu section.
The first part of the wall was built in 221 B.C. Every Emperor since the 14th century B.C. has built a part of the wall which was called the Ming dynasty. Random Fact: Wolf's droppings were used to create smoke signals from the towers on the great wall. All the above info we got from our tour leader, don't quote me!

So, this morning we were due to set off at 8.30. At 8.45 we got a call to our room...s***, we slept in!!! Don't know how - we both set our alarms! We were both running around our room getting ready and wandering what to do. Therese rang the tour leader and thankfully they had waited for us! We threw our clothes on from the day before, brushed our teeth and put the door. We were so lucky they waited for us!

Took about 1hr 30mins to get to the Great Wall, through the countryside. Got part way up the mountain in the mini-bus, then it took 20mins to walk up the side of the mountain to get to the wall. It was really steep and hard work! When we got to the top though, the views were amazing. There's a constant mist around at the moment, so you can't see very far, but it actually makes the scenery look really nice. We trekked almost a kilometer along the wall, up and down really steep steps and spent about 1hr and 30mins up there.
Then we took the toboggan down the side of the mountain! Cost 50 Yuan each, so £5. It was brilliant and we managed to get a video of it. It was just down a metal slide, not snow. At the bottom, we grabbed some lunch. You wouldn't believe where...Subway! Our tour leader recommended it as the safest place to eat. There are no other shops, just some market stalls - I couldn't believe there was a Subway.

On the drive back, we saw all the new modern buildings in Beijing. There's loads of huge buildings.
Then we went to the Hong Qiao Pearl Market. There's so much stuff to buy - electronics, bags, shoes, silk, jewelry etc. Some of the Ugg boots appeared to be very good imitations and so did the bags. Apparently, you can get A-grade fakes, which means that the factory producing the real Ugg boots might have an order for 200 pairs, but will actually make 300 pairs. The best 200 will go to the buyer, and the other 100 to the black market. We didn't buy anything but was tempted to buy a load and ship it home. We got a bit fed up being hassled though, so didn't bother. Started to get a touch of rain to this afternoon.

In the evening we all met to see a show which our tour leader arranged - Chun Yi: The Legend of Kung Fu. We caught the bus for 1 Yuan (10p) to The Red Theatre, and the show cost 180 Yuan (£18) for a Stalls seat. The show was brilliant and lasted 1hr 30mins. They did all kinds of things like breaking metal bars on their forehead and other crazy things like that!

Tried to get WiFi access today, but in all the places free WiFi is available, you have to have a Chinese mobile number. Found an internet cafe, but no Skype allowed. Cheap Internet though, 3 Yuan (30p) for 1 hour.

The rain got fairly heavy this evening, hopefully not like this tomorrow.

Don't forget to change the date at the top of this blog text too see our blog entries for different dates in the same city!