The Great Wall of China

When we arrived in South Korea, one of the first things that Miriam asked was "Now that we live in Asia, can we go and see the Great Wall of China and the Terra Cotta Warriors?"  Her kindergarten teacher was a bit of a Sino-phile, and all of the global studies she learned apparently sank in.  Thank you Mrs. Mayes!  At any rate, I told her that I would see, and I began to research a potential trip.  Soon afterward, a running acquaintance mentioned her family was going to the Great Wall of China marathon, and said that if I wanted to run, her daughter would be happy to babysit Miriam during the race.  That settled it, the trip was on.  Jake and Hans held down the home fort for this one.

We dropped Hans off at his kindergarten on our way to the bus station.  The timing of the bus was perfect, and we quickly boarded our plane to China.  A short 2-hour flight later, we landed in Beijing, cleared customs, and met up with our tour group.  (Although we usually travel independently, non-residents of China are only allowed to enter the Great Wall Marathon through tour groups).  After meeting up with our friends, we spent the afternoon exploring the neighborhood around the hotel, buying snacks, and looking through the Silk Market before dinner.

Morning dawned and after a huge breakfast of both Asian and Western foods, we set out on one of the most anticipated days -- the inspection of the Great Wall of China.  The part of the wall that the race is held on is away from the area most commonly seen by Westerners, and we took a 3-hour bus ride to see what is described as one of the most beautiful and well-preserved sections of the wall.  The inspection tour is considered an integral part of the race, a day during which we could take our time along the wall, stopping to snap photos and take in the scenery...and also find out just what would be in store for us during the race.  Namely, many of the 5,160 stair steps along the route!

Inspection Day brought gorgeous weather, and we thoroughly enjoyed our 2-mile hike.  Many people spent the rest of the day (and day after!) wondering what they had gotten themselves into and massaging their aching legs, but Miriam is a little mountain goat and scampered along the path and scrambled up thigh-high stairs in her moccasins, and still had plenty of energy left at the end of the day.

After the 3-hour ride back to Beijing, we had the first of many late nights (by Miriam's standards, at any rate), and spent an exciting evening at the theatre watching Chinese acrobats.  We loved watching the girls swing around on ribbons and the men doing diving forward rolls over chairs and through hoops, but the highlight was the finale -- 5 motorcycles zooming around the mesh "sphere of death".

The following day was spent site-seeing in Beijing, visiting Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City, and an interesting tour of a silk factory before a carbo-loading party at the hotel.

Then it was race day!  We received a wake-up call at 3:30am and were on the bus with sack breakfasts by 4:00.  Without traffic to contend with, the journey from Beijing was a bit quicker than it had taken the last time, but it was still plenty long.  We arrived at the Wall with just enough time to use the facilities (such as they are!) before getting Miriam to the start of her 5K race.  That race began with the 2-mile section we had hiked previously, along a section of the Great Wall and 2580 of its stairs before finishing up with a mile around a fort.

Meanwhile I started the marathon (26.2 miles or 42.2km).  The race begins with about 3 miles on the road from the fort up to the Wall, then sections of the Wall, followed by about 16 miles (most of it uphill) through villages and farms around the fort, before returning to the fort and retracing our steps in the opposite direction along the Wall, and 3 miles downhill back to the finish line.  This race ranks as one of the most difficult marathons, and it was hot, reaching over 90F.  Many people did not finish the race, and I took about 3 hours longer than my best marathon time.  I found Miriam shortly after crossing the finish line and we jumped on the first bus back to Beijing, and when we got to the hotel, Miriam collapsed into bed without supper.

The following day brought more site-seeing in Beijing, visiting the Olympic Park, a pearl factory, the Summer Palace, and the panda exhibit at the zoo.  The next day we visited a temple, a tea shop, and a park where we joined thousands of Beijing residents in their morning exercises. On Tuesday we flew to Xian where we saw another temple, the ancient city walls, and spent about $0.10 on the biggest cone of cotton candy I've ever seen!

And then came our last day in China.  We began at a clay shop where we watched terra cotta statues being made, and then the other major highlight of our trip -- the Terra Cotta Warriors!  We finished up with a trip to an art museum where Miriam impressed the docent with her knowledge and experience 

I'm sure no one in our tour group expected to spend their trip to China with a 7-year-old, but we greatly enjoyed ourselves with a wonderful group of people.  We said good-bye to our new friends and spent the evening relaxing at the pool of our hotel before an early start the next day with flights from Xian to Beijing, and then on to Seoul.  Our trip home went as clockwork, and even better than originally booked as we were able to get on an earlier flight and even made it home in time for dinner.

Miriam declared the adventure everything she had hoped it would be, bookended with the two things she most longed to see in the world:  the Great Wall of China and the Terra Cotta Warriors of Xian.  Success!