Sunday was our trip to the Great Wall. We were on a tour with a big group through the Hostel, and we went to the Mutianyu section of the Wall. It has a chairlift to get up to the wall, and has a toboggan down, which is awesome. The mountains were awesome. Not quite Huangshan awesome (see two posts ago), but still really awesome, especially with the wall etched into its side.
It's a pretty decent hike up the stairs. Not too bad; frankly nothing compared to the Huangshan Mountains. I think we were much better suited to climb the stairs than most others because we had just been to Huangshan and climbed thousands of stairs, as opposed to hundreds. We began at tower 6, then climbed up to tower 1, back to tower six, then to tower 12.
From there we waited in the long line to get onto the toboggan (When capacity up > capacity down, big lines form). They need to learn some Industrial Engineering and figure something out so you don't have to wait a half hour to use your ticket to get down the mountain. (Rant over) Finally, we had a good Chinese lunch and met a nice Portuguese couple who were traveling all over China for a couple weeks. It's sad that they were impressed we knew what Portugal was. Finally, we went back to the Hostel on a really hot, uncomfortable bus ride, but it was all okay because it was a truly awesome day.
And I got pictures, lots of them:
 |
| Not my finest picture, but a great background. |
If you are still scrolling, congrats, you get to read about the fourth day. That night, we went to Din Tai Fung (Same restaurant I went to in both Qingdao and Hong Kong). It was, again, excellent. They have a couple of locations on the west coast, so if you have a chance, go there; it's real Chinese food, not like Panda Express.
The next day we went to Temple of Heaven, which was awesome, but by that point we were all pretty wiped. It also didn't help that it was, again, scorching hot. Here are a few pictures:
That night was our train ride back to Shanghai. I am still recovering. It was mostly aweful; the two guys behind me wouldn't keep their mouths closed between 2 and 6 am, you know, when you're supposed to BE QUIET AND SLEEP. I met an English teacher from the U.S. teaching in a city far in the north, and had an interesting conversation with her. She was happy to be returning to the U.S. for a short visit. In her town, there are 3.5 million people, and only 50 are not Chinese. All 50 get together each Sunday, which is pretty cool.
It was nice to get back to Shanghai, and the major part of my travels are now over. I have a final on August 5th, and a project due the 11th, which is the day I return home. 11 weeks have been awesome so far, and although I want to continue my travels, there just isn't enough time. 13 weeks should be perfect.
No comments:
Post a Comment