All of the treadmills, ellipticals, bicycles and Stairmasters in the world do not prepare you from climbing The Great Wall of China. We went to a spot called Jinshangling, about 2 1/2 hours outside of Beijing. The first hour or so was just getting out of the city - the traffic was astounding. This is what six million cars during rush hour creates. Once out of the city, we drove past immense areas of land being developed. Either with huge apartment complexes or plantings of trees. There were lots of indoor farming plots, covered to be able to grow produce year round.
We made a brief rest stop break where I showed Ariana the proper way to use a hole-in-the-ground toilet (She decided she didn't have to go after all). We were welcomed by locals selling souvenirs. We passed.
The wall has been randomly restored. This pictures shows the difference - on the left, the mortar made of rice (the old) - one the right the newly restored.
We walked, we climbed, we heaved, we stopped for air, while Ariana calmly walked and skipped and mocked us by the ease in which she scaled the uneven steps.
Up and down, up and down, from tower to tower.
Finally we reached the end (for us at least0. The five-wondow tower. We had passed the one, two, three and four. We felt good.
Then came the decent. Over 1,000 steps by Arny's counting. The trip was worth every one - even though as I am typing this, my knees are screaming "never, ever do this again!!!!!!"
No comments:
Post a Comment