Day 24

All of last night's disappointment and frustration was immediately put behind me as I awoke at 6 am this morning. How could I be annoyed about anything? We were trekking The Great Wall. I was so excited. Seeing the wall had been my main reason for coming to China, so to do that and the Terracotta Warriors in the same week was tremendously satisfying.

[This post should be much longer and in-depth than it will be but the simple fact is, I don't have the vocabulary to describe just how breathtakingly awesome The Wall is, but I will try to do it justice as best I can.]

We made our way to the pick up point at another hostel, a short taxi ride away, and left at 6.40am. The minibus took us two and a half hours out of town, past some incredible scenery, towards a part of the wall called Jianshanling, where we would trek 10 kilometres to the finish point at Simatai. Seeing these fascinating rock formations and mountain ranges, I got thinking that maybe I should try to appreciate the British countryside more, but in truth, parts of China are so spectacular that I would only moan about how Britain doesn't compare. So for the sake of those close to me, maybe I shouldn't!

When we arrived at Jianshanling, we were given the option to either take a cable car up to the wall or walk it. I was so disappointed to see all but Daley, myself and three others jump straight in the queue for the cable car. I can understand elderly people using it because the trek is quite tough, but people my age just being lazy got on my nerves. What is the point of coming on a trek if you are going to do it half-heartedly? They might as well just flatten the whole thing and do the tour in golf carts if that's the case.

Anyway, rant over, the walk to the top was surprisingly gruelling, every step was the equivalent of two normal steps, so even someone like me, who is built like a daddy-long-legs struggled. Half way up the approach to The Wall I had to call a time out (cleverly disguised as a photo opportunity) before pressing on to the top, but once up there, the heavy feeling in my legs disappeared almost immediately as I was surrounded my stunning scenery as far as my eyes could see. Moments after reaching the top of The Wall, we bumped in to a guy called Felix, who was delighted to see Daley and made a big fuss about meeting, as he described it, "another brother on The Wall."

About five minutes in to the trek, Daley and I had polished off nearly all of our food supplies but it turned out to be a calculated move as the dense chocolate buns provided us with enough of a sugar boost to get through the entire journey. Along the way we took hundreds of photos and recorded videos for family and friends. It might sound a bit stupid to some to say that we took loads of photos and videos of a wall but the history behind it and the scale of the construction make it so much more than that. I felt privileged to be there, and trekking a part that wasn't packed full of tourists in their 'I climbed The Great Wall' t-shirts made it all the more special. In fact, there were large sections of the wall where it was just myself and Daley. It was incredible feeling.

Towards the end of the trek, we came to a suspension bridge, and shortly after, we were supposed to take an exit and head back to the bus. But we had paid our money and we were going to the top no matter how long it took. This was the steepest part of the wall as we were essentially climbing the side of a mountain from the bottom. The path up was a mixture of enormous steps and steep slopes, which if wet, would be impossible to walk up. My thighs and calves didn't thank me for the workout but when we reached the top of Simatai, the highest point on our trek, my eyes were certainly grateful for the panoramic views over the route we had just spent half a day walking.

Realising that we might be slightly late for the bus (about an hour) we raced down to the exit as fast as we could and chose to end the day in style by getting a zip line from The Wall, across the river, and then a boat back to the car park. As fun as that was, I did feel slightly awkward to find a full minibus giving us daggers, but it's not like you get to see one of the Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages every week so we were going to make the most of it.

We got back to our hostel about half five and went for dinner later that evening at a restaurant where you sit at a bar and pick a soup and meat, the soup is then placed in a hole cut in to the bar and heated up. Fifteen minutes later an enormous platter of veg and meat is brought out for you to cook. Initially we ordered enough food for about twelve people, much to the amusement of the staff and locals, but after some careful guidance we figured it out. I went for thinly sliced beef, which cooked in seconds, and a slightly curried soup. The perfect end to a perfect day.