China Day Three -- The Great Wall

 

Today we headed out early for The Great Wall. This was the one segment of the trip where I insisted on hiring a guide and driver because the Wall was so far away from the city center. We could have gotten there on our own, I'm sure, but I didn't want to worry about anything on this day of our trip. We met our guide, Ling Ling (like the panda), in our hotel lobby. She was 27 and studies tourism in school. She had pretty good English. We could understand everything she was saying. That was nice. The travel agency hired a nice large van for us to take to the Wall. The driver did not speak any English, but he was a good Chinese driver. I had to turn off my tendency to side seat drive as we traveled. We left in the middle of Beijing rush hour, and it was absolutely insane. I had to hold my breath several times as our driver weaved in and out of traffic. There were walkers and bicyclists everywhere weaving in between vehicles wherever they could. I was amazed that no one was hit. Two lane roads became three lane roads at the whim of the drivers. There were police officers around, but I have no idea what their purpose was. As I was commenting on the craziness of the drive Herman told me that it was that way in Brazil, and he had an international drivers license and drove in this sort of traffic all the time when he was on his mission. I could hardly imagine him as a young twenty year-old driving in this sort of chaos.

Our foggy view of the Great Wall from below

At base camp at the bottom of the mountain

The infamous squatty potty

Despite the craziness of the drive, we did eventually arrive at our destination. It was fun during our drive to
weave through little villages that were technically still part of Beijing but had a more rural and rustic feel. We chose to see the Wall at Mutianyu. It is not the most famous part of the Wall that is often pictured, but it is still really nice. Most importantly it is not as crowded. I didn't want to fight claustrophobia as I was trying to enjoy the view. We got to the Wall early, and made sure and stopped at the bathrooms before we made the trek up the wall. This was a pretty nice bathroom with Western style toilets as well as the squatty potties. The older girls decided to wait for the Western potties, but I decided that if I was going to be in China I had to at least use the squatties once. This seemed a good place to do it. It was early in the day, so they weren't gross and stinky. I stepped in and felt ridiculously awkward. But I figured it out. It wasn't awful. I had to take a picture of the now famous potty. I have heard that these squatties are better to use than the sit down varieties, but I couldn't see that. I was too afraid that I was going to fall over during the process.

Ling Ling takes a group of us
on the cable car to the Wall

Once the Great Pottty Adventure concluded we were ready to head up to the Wall. I didn't realize just how out of shape I was until I began walking up the many steps to the cable car which would lift us to the wall section we were visiting. Holy Cow! There were a lot of steps. We made it up, though, and we divided into three groups as we road up the hill. It was amazing just how high up the hill the wall is. We commented over and over how difficult it would be for an invading army to penetrate this wall during the time it was used to defend China. The cable car traveled almost vertically much of the way up. I just prayed on the way that China had good safety regulations in place for this contraption. At least for today it worked wonderfully. It was a nice little ride and sort of scenic. Today was not exactly the best day to view the Wall. It was horribly foggy, so visibility was almost zero. However, the fog gave the area an almost mystical feel as we walked along this ancient artifice. I felt like we were walking amidst the clouds. There were hardly any other people here as we walked. We were able to leisurely stroll at our own pace and enjoy the experience. The boys loved pretending to have battles as we reached each of the guard towers. It was quite a walk to get to each of them. It seemed as if it would have been terribly isolating to be assigned to one of those houses as part of your military duty. It would seem as if there wouldn't be much to see after the first couple of guard houses, but each little section held something new for us. We got several wonderful pictures of the family from different points along the way. Several of the tourists who were also visiting the Wall today would swap with us so that we could take their pictures and then they would take ours.

Another foggy view of a guard house

Laney and Katie as celebrities

 It was fascinating to see all of the nationalities present there today. We heard French, German, Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese, Malaysian, and British, Australian, and Indian English. So fun to see so many citizens of the world converge on one spot of the globe. This was a place of legend, and it was such an amazing thought to think that we were actually here. Once again Laney proved popular with the other tourists. She was grabbed by a super enthusiastic Japanese college student who wanted her in a picture with her. Ling Ling explained that this would probably happen a lot more to us when we a in Wuhan because many of the people there might have never seen a foreigner before. We will be much more of a novelty there. I can't imagine.

Bear with me as a stick a bunch of photos in here now that don't seem to fit anywhere else.  More blogging is below the pics.

Mutianyu base camp

In front of one of the guard houses

The Wall is actually on a large group of hills.
It's a long way down at spots.

Huh?

Another foggy Wall shot

I think seeing Mom and Dad kissing gets a bit old for the kids sometimes

Spencer planking on the Great Wall

She's too cute!

Hyrum guards the fort

Six Blau children sat on a wall

Our Brady Bunch pose

Hurray!

Hurray! Hurray!

This poor lady had to pack her goods all the way along the Wall.  She was selling stuff for tourists along the way.  This was the way that many people moved their merchandise throughout Beijing.

Yes, that is a donkey.

We can make it!  Pull!

What a family!

After roaming around for about an hour and a half, we headed back down the hill to the cable car. The path was lined with vendors selling souvenir things. We were newbies, so we didn't realize just how many vendors there would be. If we had known, we would have waited to start our bargaining until we were closer to the bottom. So many people purchase at the top that the ones at the bottom are desperate to sell and are more willing to make good bargains. Still we pressed through and looked at the merchandise. I was a hesitant haggler at first. I never knew exactly how much to do. One time I was working with a vendor and had almost agreed to a price when Herman stepped by and nixed the deal. The vendor kept saying, "but the lady wants it", but Herman stood firm. We moved on. I first haggled to get a little Great Wall magnet. It wasn't much, but it got my feet with the bargaining process, and I found that I was pretty good at it. And it was horribly addictive. I found myself challenging myself to get better and better deals as I moved through the vendors. We could have done much better if we'd waited until we got to the bottom vendors, but we still came out okay. We spent way less than we would have on similar items at a US tourist spot. Herman absolutely loved haggling. This was right up his alley. The man who can haggle down prices at a local Walmart had no problem doing it at a place where haggling is expected. Katie really loved it also. She would go up tp a spot with me and squeal, "Oh, this is sooooo beautiful!". I'd think, "Katie, you're killing me here," because once the vendors heard that they figured they had an easy sale. But Katie would hear their prices and then stick up her hand and sweetly say, "Boo yao," and walk on. She was a pro.

This guide at the Jade Factory was a hoot.  He shared with us the magic of jade with the best accent ever!

After weaving our way through the many vendors we finally reached the van to head to a new adventure. Ling Ling took us to the Jade Factory for lunch. It was a nice atmosphere, and the food was delicious, but it seemed a bit too much like Americsn Chinese food. I didn't feel like it was authentic enough. It felt more like the type of Chinese food they reserve for tourists. Still, it was very good. After eating we headed downstairs to see a demonstration on how they carve jade. It was very interesting -- very intricate. We had a very nice young man who took us on the tour.  He was pretty funny when we could understand his English. The jade pieces were absolutely stunning. There were some pieces that cost over $100,000. I'm not sure how people are meant to carry those things home with them. Some pieces were enormous. We saw one item that we really liked. It was a ball that had several balls carved within that was meant to represent the harmony and unity of the generations of a family. We looked at it a long time but decided that we would hold off. We were told that this place didn't really bargain much, so we didn't expect any bargains. However, as we were walking off we got a big "Hold on!" from our guide, and magically he was able to knock a significant amount off the price. We are such suckers!  We purchased the ball along with jade bangle bracelets for each of the girls. These are often passed down from mothers to daughters in China for happiness and good luck in marriage. We skipped the super expensive ones and went for the bargain basement rack, but they are still beautiful. Unfortunately Savannah and I got bangles that seem to be welded tight to our wrists. They aren't meant to be removed often, but still, that sort of freaks me out. The guide assured me that it could be easily removed with lotion, or, he added, I could always just cut off my hand. Har har.

This jade ship can be yours for only $100,000.  A bargain!

JoJo loved this jade tiger.

I'm sure we got hosed here, but we did walk away with some sweet jade bangles.  We are suckers!

Once our time at the jade factory ended we headed for the last segment of our tour. As we drove through the countryside we passed several farms which were harvesting Chinese cabbage. There were no large pieces of farm equipment here. There were just several men and women working the land as it has been done since the beginning of time. We saw donkeys pulling carts overflowing with the vegetables. Fascinating!

Spencer in front of the giant rabbit at Beihai Park.  He was born in the year of the rabbit.

Our last stop was Beihai Park, right next to the Forbidden City. This was absolutely beautiful with lots of large weeping willows, a lake, and a beautiful pagoda. It seemed like Ling Ling was ready for the day to be over because she rushed us right through the place. But to be truthful, the kids were worn out at this point too, so it was probably best to hurry. The neat thing that we saw while we were there was a group of Chinese National Guardsmen training. They ran around the lake chanting cadences as they ran. It was neat to see them working there. Herman even yelled out encouragement to the stragglers as they ran by. I'm not sure if they appreciated that or not, but they remained stoic as they passed. JoJo also made a friend.  He said "Ni Hao" to an older lady as we passed, and she gave him a little bauble with a Chinese doll at the end. We got a sweet picture of her with him.

The ladies sure love JoJo!

At Beihai Park

Can't remember what this means, but it sure is pretty!

Ling Ling then brought us back to the hotel. She got our train tickets to Wuhan for Sunday and wrote out directions for us to give to our cabbies that day. Then she helped us order dinner at a local restaurant. She was a nice guide to have for the day, but once the day was done we all agreed that we preferred exploring around on our own. So I'm glad that we made the decision to not use our travel agent for this entire trip. It was great to have her and the driver today, but there is something exciting about doing all of this on our own. It really is an adventure. The mishaps we have along the way are part of the joy of the experience. One thing that I will have to keep my eye on -- I noticed at dinner that Hyrum is starting to get a bit sad about all the attention that the people of China are pouring on JoJo. He mentioned it once, and then I started to pay attention. When the waitress would bring a dish to our table JoJo would say "Xie Xie," and she would smile and rub her hands through his hair. Then Hyrum would say the same thing and look at her expectantly, but she would do nothing. He would get this disappointed look on his face. Awwwwww!  It's hard to be young, but not the youngest. I made a vow right then that I would do my best to do things this week to help Hyrum know how special he is. 

So we made it through a big day today. I thought I was over the jet lag, but here I sit a 5:00 am typing away on this annoying iPad that I must use for now because I fried the charger to our laptop yesterday. Tomorrow we head out to see if we can get our laundry done at a local shop down the street. I'm hoping we have enough hand signals to get the job accomplished. Then we will brave Wufangjing Avenue again before heading to the Forbidden City and Tiannanmen Square. I can't wait. We are still having an amazing time. One week until we meet Minsy!