More than I bargained for

Holy shit! That was totally effin nuts. Are you kidding me? Okay- enough with the explatives, though I likely dropped enough dancing f-bombs (You know... The kind im most likely to drop. As in 'f*ckity-f*ck-f*ck') the ") on the great wall to blow it up.

So: this was no sight-seeing event. This turned out to be a group of hard-core, everyweekend for 12 years, euro-hailing hikers that go to different parts of the Wall each Sunday and hike. Sorry, make that Hike.

When the bus stopped, we were in what seemed to be the middle of nowhere and everyone hopped out of the bus to start bundling up. As well they should have since it was well under freezing. Not to worry!! I wasn't cold long, oh, no. We started up tge steep incline -a mere 60 degree incline which proved later to be nothin- at a breakneck pace.

If you'll recall, the Great Wall lines the mountain TOPS. Oh eff.

In short (since the 'hike' sure as h*ll wasn't), we were NOT just going up to take some pics and come back down. As soon as my sorry@ss made it to the top and caught my breath (no longer in the middle of the pack biut now bringing up the rear with Pierre from Holland--just wait until you see sweet Pierre's picture. And to be sure, he was being kind to stay back with me, not the other way around) off the rest of the crew went. Fastforward to the part where I think I cannot possibly go any further than the 40 minutes of excrutiating torture already endured and innocently ask (inbetween heaving breaths) 'when do we turn around?' only to learn that we don't (!). Softly followed by, 'hmm. How high do you think we are?' oh, that would be a 500m ascent.

At this point we've been joined in the back by Klas, my Swedish colleague who brought me along on this fine journey, and who was now feeling quite guilty that this very well may be the death of me. A couple hours later, as it was snowing, he turned back and said with a smile (imagine sveedish aksent) 'I got you on dees mountain, I'll be sure to get you off dees mountain!'. I replied with a hearty 'Thanks, Klas!!'

We were fortunate enough that todays path had an option -after 4 straight hours- of making it down to a valley, and then a road, and a short 30 walk back to the bus. Which I happily opted, thank you very much! I figured, well my shoes are already busted so maybe I should call it quits.


So, yes, I have seen, hiked, and become intensely well acquainted with The Great Wall of China. And in a way, I can safely say, very few others have. Therefore, I believe I can adequately check this, of the 7 World Wonders, off my list.


**please excuse the excess cursing in today's post. :)

**author's note: I recognize that there were way too many commas and side notes in this post. What can I say? Today I apparently am long-winded, need a few more pauses and am craving alternate routes.

*final note: the area we went to was near a village called hochunnen and is at the furthest east point from Beijing, almost to Taipei.

March 29, 4:30 pm, Beijing