Tour to the Great WallMay 15, 2006
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The Great Wall 1
The Great Wall 2
The Great Wall 3
Today we went to the Ming Tombs. The last Ming Emporer died in 1644. There are 13 tombs in which an Emporer is buried but only one is excavated and open to the public. We went to the 'Ding Ling' tomb which took 30,000 workers six years to build. The Emporer was buried here with his two wives and various concubines. When he died, his wives and concubines took poison so they could be buried with him. The vault was filled with furniture, food and everything for his afterlife. If there weren't enough posessions in his tomb, the Chinese believed that this person might come back as a ghost to his original home. From there we climbed the Great Wall of China, that is, we took the gondola to the top and climbed down. The Great Wall was started in the 7th century B.C. and is 6,000 kms long but only 4 kms are open to the public. The climb down (about 2 kms) is on uneven steps so one doesn't dare look up or a twisted ankle could be the result. What a great experience to see this part of history. The temperature is about 30 degrees so it was a great day for this walk. At the end of the day, the pedometer said we had covered another eight miles. That night we decided to try another Chinese restuarant down the street. This time the menu had pictures as well as English writing. Some of the menu items we DIDN'T order were: snakehead in chili oil, gastronomy crispy goose gut, pigs ears, braised frog in chili oil, mixed beef stomach & dainty pig elbow meat. Guess I don't have any space left to tell you what we did order..............
