by Patrizia Gullà
“He who has not climbed the Great Wall is not a true man” Mao Zedong
The Great Wall – perhaps the most recognizable symbol of China and one of the seven wonders of the Ancient Wold. On our third day in Beijing, the Insight China delegation had the opportunity to visit this great engineering marvel. After a delicious breakfast in the Novotel in Beijing, we started our next sightseeing tour in the late morning. From our hotel we had about one and a half hours by bus.
The Great Wall starts beyond Jiayuaguan in China’s Northwest and finally ends in Hushan in province of Liaoning close by China’s East coast. It has a total length of over 6000 kilometres. However, the Great Wall at Mutianyu is one of the best spots to visit it. A chair lift took us all the way to the wall, which looked quite similar to the ones at ski resorts. From the chair lift station you can choose to walk either left or right. Both sides are about equal in terms of difficulty of climbing.
All members of the delegation were exited to go for a short hike to have a better view and to take some pictures. And of course the view of the wall snaking was amazing and our pictures are awesome!
After two hours of walking around we took the toboggan ride with its total length of about 1580 m back down to the parking lot area. How many people can say they tobogganed down from the Great Wall of China? Pretty remembering and the entire delegation had fun and enjoyed it.
In the late afternoon, we went back to our hotel. In the evening, the delegation had the option to go to the Donghuamen Night Market which is located in the Northern end of Wangfujing in Beijing. An attraction that definitely must be experienced! The market is a veritable food zoo: snakes, scorpions, squids, bugs on a stick – and that is just the start! Our delegation was very courageous and tried such delicacies. For the less courageous members it had also noodles, dumplings and fresh fruits.
The Great Wall of China
Delegation visiting one of the “new world wonders”
Night Market
