Home | Gallery | Travelogue | Write!
Album: By Country | By Date China | July 2001 < Prev: The Summer Palace | Next: Beijing to Hong Kong >
Travelogue: By Country | By Date China | July 2001  

July 2001 - The Great Wall

One of the most fantastic places we have ever seen and one of the most frightening hikes we have ever taken

This is looking east from "Tablet Tower" at "Gaping Jaw." The tower houses a stone tablet from 1570. If you look carefully, you can see the wall running up and then down the next "hill." As we discovered, the descent from the top of that hill was very steep and challenging.

The beginning of our hike. To the left is a dam for a reservoir. In the old days, the wall had a gate in it here. The Wall is over 4000 miles long, We hike several miles worth. In about 221 BC Shih huang-ti, the first emperor and "Mr. Terra-cotta warrior," unified China. He removed most of the fortifications set up between the previous states and, beginning in about 214 BC, linked others into the "10,000 Li Long Wall" (2 li equal approximately 0.6 mile [1 km]). After Shih huang-ti's death, the Ch'in dynasty went with him, and the wall was left largely ungarrisoned and fell into disrepair. Crossing the reservoir dam The second tower
Along the wall are towers, offset to the attackers' side slightly. The idea was to get a clearer shot at bad guys who might try to climb the wall with ladders. Shih huang-ti built the wall to protect his kingdom from the Hsiung-nu. The Hsiung-nu, historically speaking, are a curious people. They first appear in Chinese historical records about the 5th century BC and disappear from the records in about the 5th century AD. Some historians believe they were the Huns,who invaded the Roman Empire in the 5th century. The Hsiung-nu became a real threat to China after the 3rd century BC, when they formed a far-flung tribal confederation under a ruler known as the shan-yü, the rough equivalent of the Chinese emperor's designation as the t'ien-tzu ("son of heaven"). They ruled over a territory that extended from western Manchuria (Northeast Provinces) to the Pamirs and covered much of present Siberia and Mongolia. The Hsiung-nu were fierce mounted warriors who were able to muster as many as 300,000 horseback archers on their periodic intrusions into North China, and they were more than a match for the much less maneuverable chariots of the Chinese. The completion of the Great Wall along the whole of China's northern frontier during the Ch'in dynasty (221-206 BC) slowed but did not stop the Hsiung-nu. Along this section, the foundations of the wall looked like stone, while the upper parts were made from brick. Standing on the roof of one tower. During the reign of the Han emperor Wu-ti (141/140-87/86 BC) the wall was strengthened as part of an overall campaign against the Hsiung-nu. From that period the Great Wall also contributed to the exploitation of farmland in northern and western China and to the growth of the trade route that came to be known as the Silk Road. Tote in a window of the Fourth Tower. Again, the tower protrudes from the wall (on the right)
"Enterprising" fellows attempt to charge visitors for using "their" ladders. Looking out a tower window Tote inspecting the construction The section on the left is the final, hair-raising part or our path
This is a Ming-renovated tower. The wall was repaired and extended until about the time the Mongols took over in about 1200 AD. The Mongols used some of the forts to control the Chinese. In its 276 years of sovereignty the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) ceaselessly maintained and strengthened the Great Wall to prevent another Mongolian invasion. The majority of the work took place along the old walls built by the Northern Ch'i and Northern Wei. Most of the Great Wall that stands today is the result of work done between 1487-1505. Monica in a window A view of the Sawtooth slope This gives a better idea of the steepness of parts of the desecent.
Tablet tower. A tablet from 1570 still on the ground in the tower. This is how you could shoot at bad guys trying to climb the wall. An arrow loop. The lintels have an elegant shape
Looking uphill Much of this section was simply loose gravel and rubble. The boys are atop a section from which the battlements have toppled. Unfortunately, the photo doesn't give a good sense of how steeply the ground falls away from the wall/causeway. This gives a better sense of the drop on either side but it's still difficult to see how steep it was. Maggie and Mark working their way to the section that has walls.
The stairs that must once have topped this section are long gone. This was steep enough and slippery enough to make us grateful for the handholds provided by the wall. If one of us slipped, I think the body would have been found several hundred yards farther down the wall. In this section, the wall was almost entirely gone, leaving the end of the wall as a cliff which is atop another cliff. A local spends his days at the top of this section tending "his" ladder and a path around this section, charging people who wish a safer route. He presumably spends his nights tearing up this section to make it worse. (The Chinese may have too many people locked up, but this fellow is definitely one that they have foolishly overlooked.) Every other place, the Chinese people were helpful; this guy nearly pushed Tote down a cliff. Looking up the next stretch of the wall. Careless wall climber