8/06/2009
Mom and I went to see the Great Wall of China! In fact, we not only saw it, but hiked five miles of it!
This was... I'd say about as easy as it sounds, but I'm not sure how easy you think it sounds. It was in the blazing sun, and oh my god, are there a ton of steps on that thing or WHAT. We went through 26 watchtowers. We hiked from Jin Shan Ling to Si Ma Tai, which is considered a less-touristy part of the Great Wall (that still has tour groups from hostels going there). We could definitely see why; parts of it were in disrepair, falling apart, and so on. I didn't mind, though, because that certainly made it more authentic. The views from either side were AMAZING, too. I imagine that once I post this on my blog, here is where I will put the pictures that my mother and I took.
Once we got farther along from the Jin Shan Ling side and towards the Si Ma Tai side, there were lots of work crews there, replacing crumbling stones and stairs and whatnot. So I guess in a few years, this are of the Great Wall will be fixed up as well, so that it too can be overloaded with massive amounts of tourists. While there were a lot of tourists here, it wasn't like packed or anything. We could hike the thing without feeling claustrophobic or anything, sometimes we couldn't really see many people around.
Though I mostly liked the disrepair, one part was pretty terrifying! Look what I had to navigate:
You maybe can't quite tell, but you can't just jump *down* from there-- you have to sort of jump to the side. If you go to the wrong side, you could very easily slip, fall, and die. At least, that's what my mom had to say. But what's life without a little adventure? I jumped face forward, with a Chinese lady grabbing my hand and pulling me towards the side I needed to go. I banged my knee, but it was just a surface bruise, it didn't hurt as I walked. My mom couldn't look down as she went, so she went backwards, legs (and backside) first. The Chinese lady, old and tiny though she was, somehow managed to heave my mom to the side, too. There was a lot of strength in that little body! I wish I'd gotten a picture, but alas.
This lady had a pretty clever setup, truth to tell. See, there are people (mostly women) selling things all along the Great Wall. Some souvenirs, fans and t-shirts and knick-nacks, and also some very useful things (like cold water [we always checked to make sure it was sealed], Coca-cola, etc).
Anyway, mostly these salesladies just have to compete with each other as you pass. This one, however, very cleverly set up her station right after that jump. So she helped you out and you're really grateful to her because, while you PROBABLY would have lived without her help, your chances of being very harmed would have been greatly increased. So when she-- a bit less pushily than the other salesladies-- offers you things to buy-- well, you want to. She helped you out, dude. Buying a t-shirt-- especially when the price doesn't seem inflated compared to the other ladies-- kind of seems like the least you can do.
So yes, this was a very clever lady (and also, as I said, a deceptively strong one, physically speaking). Which is how I ended up with my "I Climbed the Great Wall" t-shirt!
(Most of the pictures of me were taken on my mom's camera. I'll add one of the t-shirt, soon, I promise!)
It's actually very comfy-- certainly feels like cotton-- and is miraculously good at not absorbing smells. And reminds me of my adrenaline-rushing jump every time I see it. All in all, definitely a good purchase.
So, back to the fact that it's a five mile hike. In the burning sun. China, especially that area, is HOT in the summer. Plus, we started our hike around 11 am, and were told that we had to be at the end point by 2:30 pm for the van to take us home-- a many-hour drive to Beijing, incidentally. For the latter half of the trip, my mom and I took them at their word, and were convinced we weren't going to make it. How were we ever going to make it back to Beijing? We pushed ourselves faster up those stairs. So, so many stairs.
But then you get to the bridge, across the lake, and you know that's close to the end. One more watchtower. We've done it... right?
Except that you're only at the 28th watchtower. There are two more. So you stagger into the second to last one, sit down for a moment, stagger out again, and then...
The stairs.
Oh, those stairs. Those long, those steep, those unexpected and arduous stairs.
How can I possibly express the despair, the hopelessness, the disbelief upon seeing that to finish, we had to go up THOSE STAIRS?
I really wish that I took a picture from the bottom of those stairs, looking up. That might capture some of the essence. Alas, the best I have is a picture from afar, from across the lake, before we knew that it was, in fact, not the tower at the bottom we had to reach, but the one half-way up:
By this time it was, like, 2:15. My mom didn't think she could do it, so I said I'd climb the stairs and try to race to the van to tell them to wait, not to take off without her.
I crawled up those stairs. I couldn't climb them like a human being, I had to go on all fours, like an animal. But I got up them.
And at the end was a zip line! That was fun. Wish I could've gotten a picture, but since my mom wasn't with me, the mechanics didn't work out. Anyway, I put on the harness, they strapped me to a wire, and I slid across the lake and down to the bottom.
This was supposed to be the fastest way to get down. Easy for me to do, since I have no problem with heights*. Not, however, something that my mother would do. It would have been the fastest way to get to the van, except that just as I got to the bottom, the boat to take us across the lake was pulling away. There was only one boat, so I had to wait the full 15 minutes for it to come back.
My mother, who, having rested 10 minutes in the 29th tower slowly climbed the stairs and then, very sensibly, walked down the mountain to the van... actually arrived before me.
Whoops.
And of course, as we should have realized all along but we are too apt to take people at their word, we were far from the last people to arrive. The van waited until everyone was there, at 3 pm, before it left. Apparently last time the trip happened, they waited until 3:30. There was never any danger.
Anyway, tiring as it was, it was definitely a good day. Though I may forever refer to The Great Wall of China as, instead, The World's Biggest Stairmaster.
*There's a family story about a time my family and I visited, I believe, Martha's Vineyard when I was, oh, maybe 4 or 5 years old. We climbed to the top of the lighthouse, and my mom, who has a phobia of heights, was sitting on the floor, clutching the bars, rocking back and forth in terror. I, on the other hand, was eagerly bouncing all around the observation deck** exclaiming, "I want to order a pizza!! Can we order a pizza?!?"***
**which terrified her further, of course.
***luckily, I don't remember the disappointment of realizing that they didn't deliver to the top of lighthouses. I'm sure it was a traumatic realization, however.
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