Ming tombs and the Great Wall

The second day we were in Beijing we went to the Ming Tombs and the Great Wall.

The Ming Tombs are a collection of the tombs of 13 of the Ming Emperors. Construction on the Ming Tombs started soon after the Forbidden City was completed, and lasted for 200 years (thanks, Wikipedia).

The central feature of the Ming Tombs is a long walkway, which was supposed to symbolize the path from Earth to Heaven. Our group started in Heaven, and walked towards earth.

One of the statues along the way.

A unique feature of the Ming tombs is that 12 out of 13 tombs are intact. Only one was excavated, back in the 1950's, but so much was destroyed during/after that excavation that none of the other tombs have been touched since.

Lunch wasn't anything fancy since we were way on the outskirts of Beijing. But it was delicious. It tasted just like Chinese food from the mall. Also contributing to the "mall-ness" of this meal was the pile of French Fries- like an American food court on a tray.

Our next stop was the Great Wall! I could barely contain my excitement:) You can see the Wall in the background of this picture, along the horizon.

This section of the wall is in pretty good shape, but you can see how hundreds of years of traffic have worn down the steps.

Looking down at one of the watch towers.

People have scratched their names all along the wall... but it's neat to see the different characters. Chinese, Japanese, Arabic... I'm sure you could find something in just about every language.

View from one of the watch towers.

Brooke and Alison, climbing the wall.

The three of us, at the top of the section we climbed.

Sunset

After all those stairs, we were ready for a good meal. We were not disappointed. This was "hot pot" (almost like Melting Pot, if you've ever been). We each had our own pot of boiling water, a huge assortment of noodles, meat and vegetables (later they brought out 3 more plates of beef and lamb), and all the ingredients to mix up our own sauce.

Our meal also included a free beer or soft drink. Don't be mislead - I know it looks like I'm drinking an abnormally bubbly, kid-sized apple juice, but this was actually my beer.