Location: Shuiguan near Badaling, China
Today's plan was to visit the Great Wall. The town of Badaling is famous for its section of the Great Wall, which explains why it was so busy and overly touristy when we got there. Put off by the masses walking up and down the wall we continued on, hoping for a quieter Great Wall experience. Shuiguan, a few kilometers east from Badaling, is what we were looking for. Very few tourists and a fantastic view of the wall as it snakes its way up and down the steepest hillsides. What a feat to build something like this. Hiking on the wall was a great workout since many sections are insanely steep with really high steps. A very memorable experience.
In the evening we pulled into the parking lot of some kind of temple-like complex next to the highway and asked at the sales office if we could camp somewhere on their large grounds. The guys were super cool about it and offered us the VIP meeting room for the night. Great! We were curious what this place is but had no way to ask. The only hints were the English "sales office" sign and the large, temple- like building outback. After looking through some of the pamphlets we realized this was a cemetery for the wealthy. I was quite excited because tonight was going to be our last night in the tent in China and I would no longer have to transport our six tent sticks. I had thought of various ceremonious ways of discarding our tent sticks before returning to North America but depositing them in the bushes at the foot of the large stone arch at the east end of this fancy cemetary complex trumped all the other options I had come up with. I was so grateful for this. As annoying as it has been transporting these six sticks all the way from Uzbekistan, they were very dear to us because without them we would have been homeless. May they rest in peace until someone finds them and perhaps puts them to further use.
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