Great Wall 3

After falling back asleep, we were awoken by our guide’s cell phone ring that eerily was set to sound like a crying child. We got up, packed up our things and had a breakfast of bananas and granola cereal. We then set off for our last hike on the Wall. It was a glorious, sunny day and the perfect temperature for hiking. For the first two hours of the hike the only people I saw were local villagers trying to sell water and beverages to hikers. They carry huge baskets of drinks on their backs and I felt so bad for them. Robert said sometimes they will follow you for miles in the hopes that you will buy something, so you have to be firm with them and tell them right away you don’t want anything. I felt too bad to do that and instead gave a few RMB to the three that I saw. I tried to stay back from the group a little bit (after four days of being together non-stop we all needed a break) and I literally felt like I was the only one there. It was amazing.

After hiking for a few miles we ended at a river and had a choice to either keep going or to stop for the day. I asked Robert about the next section and he told me it was one of the steepest of the entire Wall; at some spots the incline was 70 degrees. He told me in the past few years three people had died from falling off the Wall, and that the local villagers had to scavenge the area to find their body parts. We decided to stop for the day.

Every Chinese person we have met has their Chinese name, and then an English name as well. We told Robert that we all wanted Chinese names, and he told us he would be happy to do so. Following are the translations of the names he assigned each of us. The names definitely fit us and made us all laugh.

Me (Zhang Chun Li): Zhang is a common last name in China, and Chun Li means, “All things beautiful begin in the spring.”
Molly M: The people’s happy phoenix
Megan: Warm harvest
Kaci and Peter: Since they are dating, they got the same last name which we all thought was funny. Kaci’s name meant “beautiful fragrance” and Peter was assigned to be the leader of the group with something like “Proud, strong tiger”.
Cas: Round pearl that takes things from the past and makes them better in the future
Kyle: Juvenile panda

To get down to the town where we were to eat lunch, we could either walk or take a zip line so we all chose to take the zip line. I have been zip lining in Puerto Vallarta a number of times, so I figured zip lining in China couldn’t be much more unsafe than zip lining in Mexico so why not? The line took us across the river and to a dock, where we boarded “The Pleasure Boat” and ended up at the restaurant in which we were to eat lunch. We had a nice lunch in the courtyard of the restaurant, then hopped in our van and headed back to Beijing.

Picture: Zip-ling to lunch