The Great Wall

Table of Con­tents Show

Overview:

The incred­i­ble Great Wall of Chi­na remains a sym­bol of the pow­er and wealth of the Chi­nese Ming Dynasty, with the wall once stretch­ing over thir­teen thou­sand Miles and despite los­ing 30% of it’s orig­i­nal struc­ture still rem­i­ning as the longest wall in the world, with the stun­ning back­drop of the Jun­du Moun­tains, the intact watch­tow­ers and the rivers and lakes of the yel­low sea

that sur­round the wall, mak­ing the Great Wall of Chi­na not only a one of the great­est hikes and sights in the world, but a tru­ly unique and awe-inspir­ing won­der.

Believed to have been con­struct­ed dur­ing the first uni­fi­ca­tion of Chi­na in 221 BC, the wall was con­struct­ed by more half a mil­lion peo­ple using forced Labour and served as a series of for­ti­fi­ca­tions and bat­tle struc­tures to both for­ti­fy Chi­na again inva­sion, ease trade and pas­sage along the Silk Road, and served as a form of com­mu­ni­ca­tion – as var­i­ous gun­pow­der sig­nals, flags and lit bea­cons would be used to pass mes­sage along the wall and across regions in Chi­na.

Although the wall is not con­tin­u­ous and is bro­ken into mul­ti­ple sec­tions – allow­ing for moun­tains and ter­rain to strength­en it, it is in the­o­ry pos­si­ble to walk the whole of the wall, although most explor­ers stick to 5 main sec­tions over a course of a cou­ple of days hik­ing, tak­ing in the re-con­struct­ed sec­tions, the orig­i­nal parts of the wall and where lucky camp­ing and trekking on the wall at night, giv­ing peo­ple a chance to both trek across and explore the his­to­ry, design and beau­ty of this tru­ly great won­der of the world.

Where:

The Great wall is 13, 170 miles long and at its peak in the Ming Dynasty stretched from Jiayuguan at Chi­na’s north­west cor­ner all the way to Kore­an Bor­der in Hushan.

Today some 30% of the wall is gone, and you’ll find the wall in the main sec­tions has been recon­struct­ed, with the best bits to see it being in the North of Chi­na based out of Bei­jing – although there’s noth­ing to stop you from tak­ing on the whole trek of the wall if you wish to see it all!

Getting There:

With the wall being thir­teen thou­sand miles long, there’s lots of ways to get there – and many acces­si­ble points to begin explor­ing it from !

But for the main 5 sec­tions of Badal­ing, Mutianyu, Simatai, Jin­shan­ling and Jiank­ou — which will let you expe­ri­ence and explore the wall either on day trips or as hik­ing (includ­ing camp­ing and trekking on the wall at night) the eas­i­est and most effi­cient way of get­ting to the wall is by bas­ing your­self in down­town Bei­jing and then tak­ing a train to Badal­ing or Mutianyu and hik­ing onward to the sec­tions of Jiank­ou, Jin­shan­ling and then Simatai – they are only a cou­ple of km apart and it saves both time, mon­ey and endur­ing what can be unpleas­ant bus rides if you head direct­ly for each sec­tion — we’d def­i­nite­ly rec­om­mend get­ting on a bul­let train as it’s clean­er, faster and eas­i­er if pos­si­ble.

For each indi­vid­ual sec­tion you can get there by:

For the Badal­ing sec­tion, which is the most pop­u­lar and re-con­struct­ed you can grab the S2 train from Beijing’s North Sta­tion and head for the eas­i­ly named Badal­ing Great Wall Rail­way Sta­tion – with a trip on the bul­let train tak­ing 40 min­utes – com­pared to a 2 hour bus dri­ve and cost­ing 20 CNY – just be sure to book in advance espe­cial­ly dur­ing peak sea­son.

For the Mutianyu sec­tion, there’s no direct train – so you can either grab a train to Huairou train sta­tion (about 1 hour) and then grab a taxi – or take your chances on one of the bus with bus 867 Dongzhi­men Wai Bus Sta­tion head­ing there – be warned though it’s on a fixed sched­ule.

For Simatai —  We’d real­ly rec­om­mend head­ing here and spend­ing a day as you can walk on the wall at night – the best option is to a tour if not doing this sec­tion as a hike – sim­ply because not only can you get on the wall in the evening (they take care of your pass­es) but it also means you can head back to Bei­jing in the evening, — for those want­i­ng to head there by pub­lic trans­port grab the under­ground from Dongzhi­men to Bei­jing Qinghe Sta­tion then on to Gubeik­ou sta­tion before jump­ing in a taxi to the start of the Simatai sec­tion of the wall.

For Jin­shal­ing the best option is take the under­ground to Wangjing West Sta­tion and then take a bus to Jin­shan­ling (luan­ping) – expect the bus­es to be irreg­u­lar in sched­ule and a lit­tle cramped – be sure to try and get a seat by your­self as well, as you could end up inhal­ing mul­ti­ple bits of ali­va from the pas­sen­ger next you if you’re unlucky.

For Jiank­ou, while there is no direct train option – we’d real­ly rec­om­mend tak­ing the route to Mutianyu and then hik­ing a short 2 and a half mile trip east to Jiank­ou, you’ll see the crowds dis­s­aprear and some fan­tas­tic scenery – it’s much more pleas­ant than spead­ing 2 extra hours on a bus.

 

Best time to Visit:

The scenery of the Great wall changes with the sea­son – so what­ev­er time of the year you vis­it you can expect and expe­ri­ence the beau­ty of the sur­round­ing fore­ts and trees – with any time in Autumn where the leaves turn var­i­ous shades of red and line the wall always a fan­tas­tic time to vis­it.

If you’re head­ing to Badal­ing and /or Mutianyu expect it to be crowd­ed at any time of the year, — but be sure to avoid vis­it­ing the wall dur­ing Chi­nese New Year in Feb­ru­ary, the May day holil­days and the Nation­al day hol­i­day that take place in the first week of Octo­ber – as the capac­i­ty of the wall will like­ly be reached.

We’d also sug­gest skip­ping a vis­it dur­ing peak sum­mer time of June and July – when not only are crowds at a max­i­mum, but also the heat in Chi­na reach­es it’s peak – so based on the above the best time to vis­it would be either in April or the months of Sep­tem­ber or Octo­ber – where you can enjoy min­i­mal crowds (for the wall !) pleas­ant weath­er and stun­ning scenery.

Explore:

At 13,170 miles – there’s a lot of the Great Wall to Explore ! – and chances are unless you have an unlim­it­ed bud­get and a year and a half to spare you won’t be able to explore it all, so below is advice on the main sec­tions, the best treks and the most unique things to do out­side the tourist hot spots – to give you the best chance of unique­ly explor­ing this won­der of the wall.

Any trip to the great wall, will require plan­ning, and for those tak­ing on more than a week long hike – be sure to check you have your per­mits from the Chi­nese gov­ern­ment in order and appro­pri­ate hik­ing and camp­ing gear.

Main Sections: (Time required no more than one day)

The fol­low­ing are the 5 main sec­tion of the walls that along­side being tourist hotspots, are the most in tact and acces­si­ble, with no more than a day required to vis­it each one:

The Badal­ing Sec­tion – The main and most crowd­ed sec­tion, Badal­ing is the most re-con­struct­ed and pre­served sec­tion of the wall – with very lit­tle of it left intact. For any­one doing a day tour from Bei­jing this will be the sec­tion you can vis­it as it sits just 45km away from Bei­jing, with this part of the wall hav­ing a cable car, a tob­bo­gen, and even bears in atten­dance to occu­py tourists.

Despite it’s focus on appeal­ing to the mass­es, and numer­ous ven­dors that dot the wall, this part of the wall is still unique and gives a great taste of the won­der of the wall – with it being a post­card pic­ture sec­tion of the wall for those quick shots and offer­ing walk­a­ble treks both north and south – after which tourist crowds will drop off.

The sec­tion in total is just shy of 8 miles – till you begin hit­ting ter­rain and bro­ken sec­tions of the wall, with 18 watch­tow­ers along the wall cur­rent­ly avail­able to be explored – we’d rec­om­mend head­ing for the less crowd­ed ones at either the north or South Sec­tion – and mak­ing sure you hike up the ridge that the wall occu­pies – allow­ing you to look back on the long and wind­ing wall to tru­ly appre­ci­ate it’s scope and length.

Just be warned that while there are direct trains and bus­es to the Badal­ing sec­tion, it’s advised to get there ear­ly as there are crowd lim­its of 65,000 which fill up fast in the Badal­ing sec­tion – as it is incred­i­bly pop­u­lar – and for those on a tight time scale, this is the per­fect spot to expe­ri­ence the unique won­der of the wall.

The Mutianyu sec­tion – the sec­ond best pre­served and intact sec­tion, the Mutianyu sec­tion also sits just out­side Bei­jing and is again incred­i­bly acces­si­ble by train (45 miles from down­town Bei­jing), with this sec­tion being idle for those who want a spec­tac­u­lar sec­tion of the wall to explore for a day with­out the tourist crowds and traps of the Badal­ing sec­tion.

The 3 mile Mutianyu sec­tion has mag­nif­i­cent and still stand­ing for­ti­fi­ca­tions – includ­ing 20 unique watch­tow­ers that date back to the 14th cen­tu­ry, and also vis­i­tors to stand on top of the wall after a small trek up a nar­row path­way, which allows for stun­ning panoram­ic views of the wall against a for­est back­drop that stretch­es for as long as the eye can see – for those want­i­ng a clas­sic yet slight­ly less crowd­ed great wall expe­ri­ence – this is the spot for you.

The simatai Sec­tion A tru­ly beau­ti­ful and unique expe­ri­ence and not to be missed – the Simatai sec­tion is much less crowd­ed than the pre­vi­ous two sec­tions, and while under­de­vel­oped in recon­struc­tion still main­tains the same unique charm that it had upon its con­struc­tion – with almost 1 and a half miles of the wall includ­ing , which dates back to the Ming Dynasty, still stand­ing in its orig­i­nal state.

For the rest of this sec­tion of the wall, which is 4 miles long in total, there is lots of great hik­ing, includ­ing a chance to stand atop of the wall, and trek to a recon­struct­ed old town of Gubei – giv­ing explores a chance to see how ancient Chi­na both used and lived near the wall.

The Simatai sec­tion also has a unique high­light, in that it is one of the few legal spots in which you walk along the wall at night – where a beau­ti­ful light path­way against the back­ground of fog­gy but vis­i­ble stars make for not only a mag­i­cal expe­ri­ence, but as you trek along the still stand­ing ruins of the wall from cen­turies ago – an expe­ri­ence that allows you to expe­ri­ence and under­stand the his­to­ry and won­der of the wall – one def­i­nite­ly not to be missed.

The Jin­shan­ling Sec­tion – A place for those who have a day and want to explore an iso­lat­ed and qui­et sec­tion of the wall that retains the charm and his­to­ry of when the wall was con­struct­ed while also hav­ing a fan­tas­tic, recon­struct­ed sec­tion.

Found 2 hours north out­side of Bei­jing , the sec­tion is set against a back­drop of hills, trees and wild ter­rain, mak­ing it a unique place to expe­ri­ence what the wall is tru­ly is – and as it stretch­es for 6

miles and fea­tures more than 50 watch­tow­ers, it’s a great place to spend a day explor­ing a unique sec­tion yet charm­ing part of the war at your own pace – and if you’re lucky by your­self.

The Jiank­ou Sec­tion - The most untamed sec­tion of the wall – this is a spot for those who want to expe­ri­ence the cur­rent state of the wall, but be warned it’s not com­plete or offi­cial­ly opened to solo trav­ellers – so you’ll need sol­id hik­ing boots and (at least offi­cial­ly) a local guide to enjoy it in a stress free man­ner.

Stretch­ing for 10 miles, the Jiank­ou Sec­tion is also part of the fan­tas­tic Mutianyu to Huanghuacheng trek – and we’d advised tak­ing it in on one of these hikes, which can be done in a ful­ly day, for a fuller expe­ri­ence, as you’ll find the wall stops abrupt­ly in places and ris­es in steep sharp ris­es — which can make it a lit­tle tough at times for explor­ing – and the ter­rain while beau­ti­ful in sum­mer can be a bit gloomy — espe­cial­ly if its wet windy.

 

Treks:

Along­side the sec­tions, the great wall also has a series of treks that can range in length from days to weeks, as you explore the 13 ‚000 miles of the wall in a unique fash­ion. For those real­ly keen on under­stand­ing and explor­ing the wall, tak­ing on one of these treks is some­thing you tru­ly can’t miss on.

While you can hike from the sec­tions high­light­ed above in a day, below are the top 4 1–2 day hikes at the wall that should be tak­en on for a tru­ly unique and enrich­ing expe­ri­ence of this won­der of the world:

Jinshanling to Simatai (2 days):

A trek that fea­tures all the hihg­lights of a great wall trek – the old and the new the Jin­shan­ling to Simatai trek allows you to trek in less crowd­ed but restored areas of the wall and against the back­drop of green forests and wild ter­rain in almost untouched and unre­stored sec­tions of the wall.

While doable as a long day trip for Bei­jing – the dis­tance is 11km – but allow for extra dis­tance as you explore the watch­tow­ers and the steep ascents, we’d rec­om­mend­ed mak­ing it an overnight expe­ri­ence as you start off with a train trip to Jin­shan­ling and being your trek east walk along the wall at night in Simatai before spend­ing the night and then either trekking back or catch­ing a bus back.

Gubeikou to Simatai (2 days)

For those who fan­cy them­selves true explores and are able to start off extra ear­ly, you can start from the sec­tion of the wall at Gubeik­ou and hike to Jin­shannling fol­low­ing the route above for the Gubeik­ou to Simatai hike which can be done over 2 days includ­ing either a hike on the Simatai sec­tion in the evening of the 1st day or cam­paign at Jin­shan­ling on the wall itself – and then mak­ing your way either fur­ther along on the wall on the sec­ond day or head­ing back to Bei­jing.

IN addi­tion to the beau­ty of the Jin­shan­ling to Simatai hike, this hike also includes the queue sec­tion of Gubeik­ou, with a series of ancient vil­lages, tombs and arti­facts that allow you to delve deep­er into the his­to­ry of the wall and those who used to and still do live here, with the full beau­ty of the cul­ture, his­to­ry and the vary­ing sec­tions on dis­play for explor­ers who trek this route.

Mutianyu to Jiankou (1 day)

An incred­i­ble day hike, the Mutianyu to Jiank­ou is a tough but incred­i­bly reward­ing hike that takes from an ancient vil­lage on the wall in Xiz­hazi to the Mutianyu sec­tion of the wall, as you tra­verse re-con­struct­ed parts and wild ter­rain where the wall drops off, against the back­drop of moun­tains, lakes and riv­er – for a spec­tac­u­lar hike along not only the wall but against stun­ning nature, in a true con­trac­st of the beau­ty of the wall.

Achiev­able in one long day, you’ll have to get 50 miles out of Bei­jing on train to the foothills of Xiz­hazi to start the hike – and then head west, but for those who want to expe­ri­ence the ‘real wall’ away from crowds – this day hike is the one for you.

Shanhaiguan to Laolongtou (the wall meets the sea – 1 days):

The ulti­mate off road explor­er mul­ti-day hike, the Shan­haiguan to Lao­long­tou is only 1 and a half miles long, but allows you to pass not through unique vil­lage towns but also see the end of the wall, where it meets the sea at Lao­long­tou, for a tru­ly unique expe­ri­ence.

Achiev­able as a day trip – if you leave ear­ly enough, you need to head a few hours out of Bei­jing to the town of Shan­haiguan and pick up the wall at the spot of the pass under the heav­ens ‑a heav­i­ly for­ti­fied gate – from here it’s a gen­tle stroll with the sea breeze in your hair which brings you to the Old Drag­on Head’ – the place where the wall meets the sea and the offi­cial end of the wall – to expe­ri­ence and take in a spot of the wall that few ven­ture to.

Unique things to do:

Along­side trekking along the wall, both dur­ing the day and the night, there’s 4 unique expe­ri­ences on the wall that can fur­ther add mag­ic to your trip, while some of them may sound corny, you can’t miss them on the wall if you’re tru­ly look­ing to explore it:

Take a Tobog­gan trip – as strange and odd as it may sound, you can slide down the Great Wall in a Tobog­gan – and it’s a lot of fun. Avail­able for CNY 120 at either Badal­ing or Mutianyu it’s a great way to both reqard your­self after a long hike and get your adren­a­line pump­ing as the beau­ty of the wall unfolds before you as you zip down at great speed.

Night Trek – while a lot of the wall activ­i­ties are right­ly focused on trekking, there’s one unique expe­ri­ence which often escapes explor­ers – a trek along the wall at night, with the Simatai sec­tion of the great wall, which sits 80 miles away from Bei­jing avail­able to allow explor­ers to hike on the wall under stars and with the aid of lamps for a tru­ly unique and not to be missed expe­ri­ence.

Camp­ing on the wall – For those tak­ing on long treks or who just get sick of hotels, you can camp on the wall at Jin­shan­ling, where a legal camp­ing base sits and offers respite for those tak­ing on mul­ti day treks – and for those who don’t fan­cy trekking a tent and sleep­ing bag with you, you even have the option to hire cam­paign equip­ment from the Jin­shan­ling camp­ing base.

The Huangyaguan Great Wall Marathon Race – for some­thing com­plete­ly unique and off the beat­en track, every May 3 hours out­side of Bei­jing in Ji Coun­try on the Huangyaguan sec­tion of the wall a marathon along the wall takes place !

Run­ning since the turn of the cen­tu­ry, the Marathon takes in the stun­ning scenery of the wall, Chi­nese vil­lages and re-con­struct­ed and decayed parts of the wall in the mid­dle of spring, with the race offer­ing a chal­leng­ing (and hope­ful­ly quick) unique way to see the wall, just note you have to reg­is­ter in advance and it’s a 42km marathon – so you don’t have to run the length of the wall.

 

How long to stay:

This one is tru­ly up to your­self – based on how much of the wall you wish to Trek! – while it is pos­si­ble to see the wall on a day trip from Bei­jing, for a stay where you get to explore

the main 5 sec­tions and camp and trek on the wall at night this can be done over 2 / 3 days – with an extra day for the trip to see where the wall meets the sea.

Top Tip: While there are many walk­ing spots giv­en the length of the wall, very few peo­ple who vis­it the wall actu­al­ly expe­ri­ence any­thing out­side of Badling or Mutianyu – so we’d strong­ly rec­om­mend set­ting a few days aside to walk not just those two sec­tions, but also expe­ri­ence the beau­ty of:

- trekking at Simati at Night

- camp­ing under the wall in Jin­shan­ling

- Tak­ing on an addi­tion­al trail list­ed above – based on your loca­tion and time.

- hik­ing to the ‘end of the wall’ at Lao­long­tou where the wall meets the sea

These three expe­ri­ences will tru­ly set you apart from the crowds and tourists and can all be done over the course of a busy week, which along­side the marathon and Tobog­gan­ing down the wall – will give you a tru­ly unique expe­ri­ence of this won­der of the world !

Cost:

Again this is one tru­ly up to your­selves, what we’d sug­gest though is to avoid a tour – they are nor­mal­ly over­price, restric­tive and don’t give you a true expe­ri­ence of the wall.

We’d sug­gest bud­get­ing 100 CNY for trav­el one way to the wall for one of the main 5 sec­tions, 50CNY for entrance fees, and a fur­ther 500CNY for each day you spend hik­ing on the wall to account for food, accom­mo­da­tion and fees for camp­ing / hik­ing on the wall at night – mean­ing the aver­age cost of a wall trip is 150CNY as a base and 500 CNY for each day spent hik­ing.

Fun Fact:

Along­side the top tip of trekking on the wall at night in Simatai, camp­ing on the wall at Jin­shan­ling and tak­ing part in the great Huangyaguan marathon in May, it’s a fun fact that the wall despite it’s length and grandeur is not vis­i­ble from space – at least with mod­ern tele­scopes – not was it built to repel the Mon­gols (or drag­ons if you believe Hol­ly­wood) – how­ev­er despite the debunk­ing of these two myths, the wall is still spec­tac­u­lar and a tru­ly unique won­der of the world.

Best photo spot:

While this again depends on the route you take – as more unique pho­tos open up the fur­ther you ven­ture along the wall – chances are any trip to the wall will take in the Badal­ing sec­tion and if so you can get the per­fect post­card snap look­ing along the wall from the high tow­er of Num­ber 8 – which is hand­i­ly acces­si­ble by a cable car

For those after some­thing unique, make sure you take in the Simatai great wall walk, for a snap lit by lights, against a back­drop of both the won­der of the wall but also the night stars, for a tru­ly spe­cial pho­to of this won­der

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