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Thursday 2005-02-24 - Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Hiking
Yesterday I sent an email to Marie Josee, and today I already have her reply: since both Carla and me want to stay in the Kathmandu Valley a week’s extension of the trip should be sufficient. She’s looking forward to it, too!
Wednesday 2005-09-21 - Beijing, China
Great effort on the Great Wall
Today is the big day. Last year when I was in Beijing I wasn’t able to do the hike along the Great Wall because my foot hurt too much (I only later found out it was broken). Now, with an ankle sprained not a week before we left and a heavy cold still bothering me, I’m not exactly in optimal condition for this undertaking, but I’m not to be deterred: I promise myself to do this and I’m going to: you really haven’t been to China unless you’ve visited the Great Wall, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987.
The alarm goes off at 5:15 in the morning: we have to leave at six! The stretch of the Wall we’re going to walk, from Simatai to Jinshanling is about a three-hour ride from the city, and we’re soon in the middle of the rush hour. It’s amazing just how big this city is: it takes very long before we leave it behind us and see fields from the bus windows. Not so much afterwards, though, a little after eight, the engine suddenly starts to make a funny noise and the driver stops the bus along the road near what amounts to a truckers cafe: some plastic tables and stools outside where simple meals are served. The driver starts checking the engine, borrows a bucket of water at the cafe, brings it back, and declares it’s good to go, so we all get in again. He turns the key and … nothing. All out again. It seems the starter engine is broken. Are we really going to walk on the Great Wall today?
The driver arranges alternative transportation for us (mobile phones are ubiquitous now in China) and not too long afterwards a car and three micro buses arrive, and on we go — with just over an hour’s delay. After we turn off the main road, at 10 km from Simatai, the landscape gets more beautiful; we’re riding through a river valley now. At the entrance we buy our first ticket (30Ұ; every stretch that’s accessible requires a separate ticket, we’ll have to buy a few more). Our hike starts at 10:30.
I’m actually rather worried, my cold makes me feel rather weak, and my sprained ankle is still painful and I worry about making it worse. But Marie Josee promises she’ll stay at the back of the group, and that’s reassuring. Across a little bridge over the river and then up we go along a bit of “fake wall” to one of the towers. I take out my GPS to record where we start: N 40.66188, E 117.27609; elevation 306m.
The first stretch of the wall here is fully restored but it’s quite steep down to a (metal) bridge across the river where we have to buy our next ticket to be able to cross (5Ұ), and from there up a steep incline again. This is especially hard because there are very high steps on the steepest stretches, almost too high for my short legs: I have to literally push myself up and tire quickly. I’m soon the last of the group. But after the restored stretch ends it gets even harder: it’s still just as steep here but now on the broken stones and rubble it gets hard to keep my left foot horizontal to spare my sprained ankle. A good thing I took my monopod which doubles as a walking stick: I really need it here.
All around me is my reward: a landscape of endless rolling steep hills and low mountains, mostly untouched, over which the Great Wall snakes from hilltop to mountaintop with a tower on top of each. And all that in glorious sunshine with a blue sky. With still a long way to go, I can’t stop every moment to take pictures but I still take quite a few. Still, the enormous scale of this defense wall in the landscape is hard to capture in pictures. Tourists are coming by the bus full to look at the wall, and a few of them even walk to a tower and back, but it only really sinks in when you actually feel it with your feet, going from hilltop to hilltop, up and down and up and down. Hikers on the wall are from all over the world, but the only Chinese are their guides. At what I think is the highest point I take another measurement with my GPS: we’re now at N 40.67046, E 117.26532; and 502 m high (later I see the next tower is just a little higher still, but not by much).
Marie Josee worries about my slow pace and asks if I want to go back — but we just left the hardest part behind us: no way am I going back to walk those steep stretches again. So on we go and luckily we hear of an easy shortcut below the wall that will save us a several towers. We decide to take it. All over the wall are Mongolians selling books, postcards, T-shirts and other souvenirs: the Mongolian border is nearby. They can be quite bothersome though: if you don’t say “no” firmly enough they’ll come after you and keep following. When we want to take the shortcut, a Mongolian woman comes with us, and shows the way (obviously hoping to sell us something) — a good thing though since it’s only a narrow trail, at places hard to see, and not at all as “easy” as the people telling us about it suggested. Just when I think we’ve had the hardest part, already close to where the path joins the wall again, I suddenly find myself stretched out along the path flat on my belly! There was a tree root in the shadow that I missed completely… Marie Josee comes running back, and the Mongolian woman wants to pull me up and starts dusting me off. “No, wait,” I gesture, and just sit up first, putting out feelers in my body to see how it feels: no alarm signals come back. Then I allow the two women to pull me up and slowly I stand: I can still walk, but my legs are quite shaky.
The woman offers to take my backpack and camera bag, and Marie Josee starts bargaining with her — she asks 50Ұ: far too much, 15 would be OK. At first she refuses, so Marie Josee takes my bags but later she agrees after all. She helps me over all the difficult spots, too, giving me a hand for support or to pull me up: of course she’s earning some money but she is genuinely caring. After the shortcut, the wall seems easier; I stop every now and then to take pictures again. The Wall and the landscape are still breathtakingly beautiful and impressive.
We have to buy another ticket for the last stretch of the wall and Marie Josee nearly starts a fight with the woman selling the tickets: last year she was in the same spot selling fake tickets but after some to and fro it turns out this time the tickets are for real — and needed.
A little before the point where we have to leave the wall the woman says she has to go back now: the border closes at a certain time and it’s a long walk back. But the last stretch is restored wall again and easier to walk on although I find the inclines harder to walk down than the steps. But Marie Josee is now carrying my bags and I can manage on my own. We find Henk, Carla and Gwendoline have been waiting for us (the ladies are quite tired as well) and with our little group we walk down to the parking place to meet the rest of the group.
We find our driver with a new bus — and just two of the group: the rest has not appeared yet! First we all sit down to have a drink (Marie Josee treats me to a beer) and wait. But soon we get restless: where can they be? If they walked on, they’ll find they can’t go further at one point but will have to walk a long way back: we may be in for a long wait… When they finally appear we hear their story: they did indeed miss the road down to the parking place and walked on to the next tower, spotting us through their field glasses and deciding to wait for us there; when they could no longer see us and we didn’t appear it dawned on them they were too far and went back. Lucky for them (and us) they didn’t walk any further!
Back in the hotel at 9:30 after a long drive through the falling evening, I go out with Carla and Gwendoline to ‘our’ neighborhood restaurant where for a change I have a good appetite: the chicken with cashew nuts is delicious!
Only then, back in my room, I finally take my shoes off and inspect my toes which started to hurt after my fall and are hurting even worse now. There’s nothing to see though: no swelling, no bruise: it can’t be too bad. Hopefully it will be better before Nepal!
Wednesday 2006-08-30 - Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Go hiking or not?
Although I’d received my first issue of the Beijing Hikers newsletter the day after I signed up, I still have no reply on my mail asking if I could join the two hikes on 16 and 17 September in Beijing. Getting worried that there may be a misunderstanding, or confirmation is sent only shortly before a hike (and I probably won’t be able to read my email while still in P’yongyang) I send off another email.
Thursday 2006-08-31 - Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Beijing hikes confirmed!
Today I got an apologetic email back from Huìjié of the Beijing Hikers: it turns out that my first mail was received, and understood, and answered. Except this reply somehow did not reach my mail box.
Well, no need for an apology — it’s not her fault the mail didn’t reach me! But I don’t have a clue why it didn’t arrive: I was using my Yahoo email on purpose so there was no chance of a mail being discarded because of a black list. And I did check the ‘bulk’ folder that Yahoo mail uses to store mails it thinks are spam.
But a seat has been reserved for me for the hike on Saturday and Sunday, the 16th and 17th of September: I’m all set. I’m excited — I’m really looking forward to these hikes; it should be a great way to start off my stay in Beijing!
