The Great Stairs Of China

After the show finished in Beijing we had a couple of days off and decided to go see the great wall and Olympic village. Since the great wall is one of the wonders of the world of the world I had pretty high hopes. It was about an hour drive from our hotel and I was a little disapointed at first. The first thing we saw was the Great Wall of Souvenir shops.














But we kept walking and finally came to the wall. It was not very impressive. I don't think the Mongols would have had a very hard time scaling it. I realize Asians are shorter than westerners but I could have stepped right over the thing.


















After a bit more walking we came upon the real Great Wall which is really more of a Great Stair Case. There are steps and steps and steps. It goes on forever and they obviously did not anticipate western tourists when they built this because the stairs vary in height from 2"-24" with no real rhyme or reason.














We went up the first few thousand steps when I came across this sign which I think means we should be on the lookout for anyone with a heart condition. I'm really glad we didn't, because if someone fell going up those steps they could have taken out several thousand tourists on the way down.














Cell phones are also forbidden but only during thunderstorms.














We climbed and climbed and climbed. And got tired. I really hoped there was a water slide that went down the back side, but you just had to turn around and go back the way you came.















But it was totally worth it. Once we reached the top we were greeted by - you guessed it - another souvenir shop that offered certificates for climbing the Great Wall but they also had beer.

Its an amazing sight and I have no idea how they mange to get all those souvenirs up there, let alone all the damn rocks it took to build the thing!











































I think next time I will opt for the Great Escalator of China!