Beijing Impressions, Day 5

Headed off to the Great Wall this morning. Confession: I cheated and took the cable car to the top. Yeah, I know, I'm not proud of myself either, but my feet were still killing me from yesterday. It could be worse; I could have stopped at the Great Wall Starbucks. There used to be one at the Forbidden City too.

That bottle of tea I mentioned yesterday? RMB 10 on top of the wall; how's that for a captive audience markup. Yeah, it's an awfully commercialized place. Disney-fied, too: the part I visited has been heavily reconstructed, and probably looks relatively little like it did originally. The wall may have been a zillion miles long once upon a time, but these days the vast majority is falling apart or has vanished completely.

It's also super, super, super crowded. Claustrophobes need not apply; it's shoulder to shoulder in some parts. Consider: most of the paving stones across the top of wall have been worn concave in just a few decades of foot traffic. You also have to watch your step, quite literally, as it's incredibly steep, uneven, and generally trecherous.

Of course, everyone knows all this in advance, but they still go, because it's one of the Eight Wonders of the World and all. Just to put the myth to rest: you can't see it from space, thank you very much.

In other news: You still can't swing a cat within an hour of Beijing without hitting an athlete; they were everywhere up on the wall. We passed a bunch of very serious-looking bicyclers on the way back into Beijing; considering the road race events are held in that area, I wouldn't be surprised if they were athletes out training.

More to come about the afternoon festivities...