The Great Wall of China
The famous Great Wall of China is a must-see attraction for any visitor to Beijing. Do you have any idea how long the Great Wall of China is? The enormous wall stretches over approximately 6,400km across northern China. The carriageway has a width of about 7m and an average height of about 8m. Apart from the wall, there are fortified towers, signal beacon towers and garrisons which form the whole structure.
Here is a bit of the Great Wall of China history. The earliest stages of the building of the Great Wall occurred around the 5th century BC, but the present structure was created around 220 BC by Qin Shi Huangdi, who was the first Chinese emperor and founder of the empire. So now, you know who built the Great Wall of China! Under his direction, the smaller, previous constructions formed by some individual states were linked up and these were further extended northwards. The purpose of this project is to ward off horse-riding nomads. Soldiers and peasants from all parts of the country spent many years of their lives building this wall. The building process is extremely tedious as large blocks of rock weighing several hundred kilograms need to be heaved up the steep slopes to construct the high wall.
It is a good experience to take a Great Wall tour in one of the sites. There are many wall sites visitors can go to view this remarkable structure and these include Badaling, Mutianyu, Simatai and Huanghua Cheng. The Badaling site is the most popular site and there are several souvenir stalls, tourist facilities and cable car in this site. Many visitors would normally stream past the souvenir stalls before surging up the wall. There is a Great Wall Circle Vision Theatre where a film on the history of the wall is shown. This show lasts for about 15 minutes. From Badaling, the view of the wall winding its way over the hills is truly breathtaking.
Mutianyu is located about 80km north of Beijing. One of the benefits of choosing the Mutianyu site to view the wall is that it is not as crowded as the Badaling site. There are quite a number of watchtowers here. Some parts of the wall here were not rebuilt and visitors can see the original structure as it is. Visitors can choose to walk up the steps (approximately 1,000 steps) or take the cable car, from the bottom of the hills to the wall.
Located about 110km northeast of Beijing, the Simatai site provides fabulous views of the wall and the mountains. The wall here has only been partially repaired. The hike at Simatai is more difficult than those at Badaling and Mutianyu as most sections of the wall are steep, uneven and dangerous to tread. The eastern section of the wall leads to very steep sections of the wall and thereafter to some impassable ruins. Many tourists chose to visit this place because the panoramic mountain views here are truly stunning.
Huanghua Cheng, located about 25km west of Mutianyu, is less developed as compared to the other sections of the wall. The wall here is split into two by a large reservoir. The right hand route is more popular with visitors because the left hand route is more difficult to reach. The crumbling sections of the wall found here can prove to be too dangerous for hikers.