3 days in Beijing- 10/28/2023-10/30/2023

Getting to the Mutianyu Great wall-10/28/2023

We are in Beijing and today we are visiting the Mutianyu Great Wall.  It is complicated to visit the wall on your own as it is located about 2 hours from the city center and most of the people in China do not speak English so we hired a private tour for the 4 us. 

A chauffeur and our tour guide David picked us up at our hotel in very comfortable van that can seat 6 people.

After 2 hour drive we arrived at the entrance of Mutianyu great wall.

Our tour guide David leading the way.  From the entrance the Mutianyu wall is still about 1.3 miles away.  David already bought the tickets for us so all we had to do is to scan our passport to get in.

We are at the bottom of the Mutianyu Great Wall offers both Western and Eastern routes. David Suggested that we take Eastern route.

View of the mountain at the base.

From the entrance you have to pass by the main Market street filled with commercial shops and restaurants.

The commercial area where people can grab something to eat and do a little shopping....

We arrived around 10:00 ish and it is starting to get crowded.

Beautiful umbrellas hanging above.

Souvenirs shops along the way...

We had to stay in line to catch a shuttle bus that will take us up to catch the cable car.

Lots of people queuing up but it is really well organized and we did not have to wait that long.

Kevin and Kristie hoping on the bus.

This bus can hold a lot of people and it was very comfortable.  The ride was not very long to get up.

The bus dropped us up and we still have to walk a while to get to the Cable car.

A guy dressed in a Chinese outfit carrying a bunch of flags.

We passed by the Chine Stone Museum but we did not get in.

There is no way we can make it on our own if we did not have a guide.  The place is humongous and there are so many routes to get up to different location of the wall.  So glad David is here to guide and to take us to the most scenic part of the wall.

Entrance to the cable car.

Taking the cable car...

View from the cable car.

We are already pretty high up as we are above the top of the trees.

Once we get off the cable car we still had to go up more stairs.

We are now queuing to catch the gondola ride.

Staying in line....

The line is moving fairly quickly so the wait was not bad at all.

Our turn to get into the gondola.

We are going to top of the mountain and once you get off you still have to walk a while to get to the entrance of great wall.

Map of the great wall.  We are going to the left.

Path way to the entrance of the Great wall

We are starting to the see the great wall in the distance.

View of the great wall.

A few more minutes to get there...

It is pretty amazing to see it close up.

We are starting a watchtower 14.  There is a total of 23 watchtowers.

This is the entrance of watchtower 14.

Next...Mutianyu Great wall