The Great Wall of China!

The last leg, really day of our girls trip was spent in Beijing, China. We had a 23 hour layover in the city. I decided we should make the most of it and do some type of day tour. Unbeknownst to me when I started planning, that the Great Wall is only a hour drive from Beijing. That was it! We were going to the Great Wall. 

We flew from Hong Kong to Beijing in the evening. Our flight was delayed, so we did not get in until 2am, or later. I cannot remember. It was a long night. When you go to China you have to have a visa. there are visas you can get at the air port for up to 72 hours. There is not very good signage in in the Beijing airport, so it took us a while of waiting in one line to be told to go to another line to get our visa. Getting the visa did not take a lot of time. We had all our travel information printed out and the process was quick. We did not get to our hotel till 4:30am though. 

We booked a tour to the Great Wall and Summer Palace with Mike's Beijing Tour. When you go to China I highly recommend getting a tour guide. They do not understand/speak English very well. I had to show our cab driver our hotel address typed out in Chinese for him to know where to go. No English. I was pleased with our tour. Our guide spoke very good English, which was huge. I would not have been able to enjoy myself with out having a Mandarin speaker with us. They picked us up from our hotel and dropped us off at the airport when the tour was done. That was really important for me to find someone with the flexibility to drop us off where we needed to go. It was a private tour, just me and Cosette. We had a driver, English speaking tour guide, and a clean car. Our tour did not include fair to attractions or food. At the end they gave us a magnet! Our tour guide was very nice. I felt comfortable and safe, cause not gonna lie, I was a bit nervous to be traveling in China by myself. 

We went to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. We took a ski lift up to the Wall. It was super ghetto. The seat like a porch swing with only a bar that went over our lap. Not secure at all. That made it more fun! It was so cool! Hard to believe we are standing on one of the wonders of the world! It was really cloudy, so we did not have a good view from the wall. But who cares? We are on the Great Wall of China! Our guide spent a little bit of time with us, but then left us to ourselves. We spent the next two hours hiking up and down the Great Wall. It is hilly. It goes up and down, up and down. It was just cool though. The section we were on has been well kept. Definitely weathering from the elements, but not broken down. There was a section of stairs that did have a plastic covering over them, because the stairs beneath were deteriorating. We could see the original stairs underneath, and that was really cool to see. 

Unlike our previous destinations, it was cold in Beijing. We wore long sleeves, pants, and light jackets and were okay. 

Let the adventure begin!

 

Coco took this picture. I was so tired, haha.

Great Wall selfies. 

We took a toboggan down the mountain. Cosette was so excited about it. She loves to go fast. It was again, kind of ghetto. metal luge looking seats, with a stick you held onto to control your speed. We got to control how fast we went. There were people set up along the toboggan path to keep everyone in check. There were no collisions while we were on it. Definitely the highlight of the day there. 

Our guide met us and then took us back to the airport. That was our day in Beijing. I wish we could have done another sight, but ce la vie. We were there on a Monday, so could not do the Forbidden city because it is closed on Mondays. 

I was sad to leave Asia. That part of the world is very special to me. It was really nice to go back and spend time with my girl.