The Great Wall

Hi folks. We just got back from the Great Wall and Ming Tombs. The Great Wall was supposed to be a highlight of our trip and it lived up to its billing. It's about 1 and 1/2 north of Beijing (absent traffic, it would be about 15 minutes, which should give you an idea about the traffic here). Then, you can climb the easy route or the tough one. Susan chose the easy route, climbed for about 2 minutes and decided that she had done enough. I went about 45 minutes the tough way and - well, it was tough. It has incredible climbs and all I could think about was how they did a marathon here (btw, if my friend Peter is reading this - I ran this morning to and around Tienammen Square - awesome!).

After the Great Wall, we had lunch and the obligatory shopping, then to the Ming tombs which were rather disappointing. Not much to see, actually.

Aside to Danny: Yes, I know how to post pictures to make this blog more interesting - how dumb do you think I am? And before you answer that, how much do you want to come with us to Barcelona? The reason I'm not posting pictures is that I didn't think to take the cable to connect the camera to the laptop!

Uh, sorry for the rest of you having to read that - I'm sure you enjoy my writing enough without need for pictures, right?

OK, tomorrow we leave real early for X'ian, which we are told is a 1 hour 40 minute flight. Since I'm not taking the laptop, there may not be any updates for 48 hours, so I hope you all can find some other form of entertainment!

Hope everyone is well - we are fine and enjoying this experience very much.