Day 4 – 1st June 2009 – The Great Wall, The Ming Tomb and Factories

Today was like the main event of my trip. I’m going to climb the great wall. We stop at the Jade factory which was coincidentally on the way to the Great Wall. Haha, somehow I was never really a fan of Factory visiting. We did not purchase any jade, but I bought those little inverse bottle painting as souvenir.

Learning and having some fun from the bus driver

Jades

Located 60km away from downtown Beijing, Juyongguan Great Wall was only recently open to the public during the Beijing Olympic. The Juyongguan great wall is connected to the popular Badaling Great Wall in the north via a divider at the last tower (highest tower).

Me at the Juyongguan Great Wall. Still a long way more to go.

Long traffic jam

Looking down at the Souvenir tower. They sell really expensive ice cream here.

On almost every tower, you will see a CCTV installed.

Rows of souvenir shop next to the smelly toilet.

Almost, almost

Finally, the last tower for Juyongguan Great Wall

To the left will lead you to Badaling Great wall and to the right, back to where you started.

I’m a true man.

Like the saying goes, “He who does not reach the Great Wall is not a true man” Yes, I’m finally a man.

Exhausted, we had lunch our at a restaurant right above the pottery factory not far from the great wall. Lunch wasn’t good as every dish that came was really oily.

Workers working on handmade pots.

There won’t be any photos for the next attraction I was visiting, The Ming Tombs. Our tour guide actually advice us not too for Feng Shui purpose. Being superstitious myself, I decided to heed the advice and pack my camera away.

There weren’t much to see in the tomb except for a few replicas. Most of the originals were stolen and burnt during the revolution. I was quite confused actually, why people were actually making wishes in a tomb. You’ll see mountains of notes lying around the replica coffins and a well. I’m not joking and it’s not small amounts. A lot were actually 1000RMB notes.

Our next destination is yet another factory. Medicine Factory Bai Fu Ling, which sells magical medicine or so it claims. A cream which can be used for anything from mosquitos’ bites, pimples, rashes to burns.

We had our dinner at a hot pot restaurant. This was one of the best dinner I had through my trip. Fish based soup, but not fishy, with lots of delicious meat.

Yummy

My Family

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