The Great Wall

Our journey to the Great Wall took a little over an hour from Beijing and it was nice to leave the grey haze of Beijing the high rise concrete blocks and the traffic congestion and head into the rural areas. Our guide had told us that we were visiting one of the most scenic and less crowded sections of the Great Wall at Mutianyu and we were not disappointed. The complex is very new and the picturesque avenue of small shops and stalls is a great place to pick up some fresh nuts and dried fruit for which the entire region is famous. The avenue leads up toward the cable car station and on the day of our visit there were no crowds and few tourist buses around so we had sections of the Wall pretty much to ourselves. The weather was marvellous creating great photo opportunities.
We had lunch at the nearby country restaurant a few kilometres from the complex. The vegetables and ingredients are all fresh from their gardens with fish is a speciality caught in the local streams.