The Great Wall

i tried to make the most of what free time i had. and so that meant checking out every touristy thing possible, esp since i'm not sure when i'll ever be back. and because i didn't have a clue where anything was, i followed someone's recommendation and signed up for a tour.

now if you ever take a formal tour in china, you will be subjected to stuff you don't want to see and they won't tell you you're seeing it til it's too late and you're in the car. the idea is to take you to every state-run shop w/the hopes you'll buy oodles of crap to haul home as gifts, and this tour was no exception.

still, i did eventually get to the wall. it's HUGE! the wall extends for approximately 1,500 miles across northern china, which in ancient times, was a very laborous way to draw a line in the sand.

it's really hard to walk on too. stone has no give, and my knees ached for 2 days afterwards.

and there's so many damn stairs! i have no idea how many steps i climbed, but i was certainly reminded how much i hate the stairmaster..

we went up at badaling, where the steps can be steep, uneven, and of course, crowded w/tourists. the only way to get away from all of them is to just climb higher...

i had so much energy at the start.

see how naïve i am???

no one tells you how painful it's going to be. my quads were burning and i was out of breath by the time we got to the 2nd tower. and obviously that was nowhere near the end.

fortunately there were a few things to look at along the way...
...and fantastic views despite the cloudy weather.
after taking some time for pictures and to catch our breath, we trekked back down.

altogether the climb up and down took about 90 mins, a bottle of water, and very comfy tennis shoes. i had to strip somewhere in the middle cuz i was SWEATING like a pig, and the only reason why i'm smiling here is cuz i had finally returned to bottom.

(top to bottom, L to R: state-run lacquer vase store; jade factory worker designing a trinket; start of the climb; end of the climb; foolish me thinking this was going to be a good workout; funny sign for the truly stupid; random string of locks which i think were part of some kind of fundraiser; views of other sections of the wall and the surrounding hillside; me, grateful to be back at bottom)