Traveled up north and paid a visit to The Great wall of China. We toured Ming’s Tomb, a jade Factory and concluded the day at the wall. The section we visited is Located about a one hour ride out of the Capital city. The Great Wall of China is a series of stone and earthen fortifications built, rebuilt, during the 5th century BC and the 16th century to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire during the rule of several successive dynasties. If you have never visited the wall i would highly recommend it, it’s truly one of the wonders of the world! We toured “North Pass” of Juyongguan pass, known as the Badaling. Please read more to see more photos of our visit and learn interesting facts about the great wall of China.

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The base area is a bit of a tourist trap with vendors hawking every kind of wall memorabilia imaginable. (the peepee boy is a hoot!) Camels and bears added to the carnival like atmosphere.

The Great Wall is the world’s longest human-made structure, stretching over approximately 6,400 km (4,000 miles) from Shanhaiguan in the east to Lop Nur in the west, along an arc that roughly delineates the southern edge of Inner Mongolia, but stretches to over 6,700 km (4,160 miles) in total. It is also the largest human-made structure ever built in terms of surface area and mass. At its peak the Ming Wall was guarded by more than one million men. It has been estimated that somewhere in the range of 2 to 3 million Chinese died as part of the centuries-long project of building the wall.

The first major wall was built during the reign of the First Emperor, the main emperor of the short-lived Qin dynasty. This wall was not constructed as a single endeavor, but rather was created by the joining of several regional walls built by the Warring States. It was located much further north than the current Great Wall, and very little remains of it. A defensive wall on the northern border was built and maintained by several dynasties at different times in Chinese history. The Great Wall that can still be seen today was built during the Ming Dynasty, on a much larger scale and with longer lasting materials (solid stone used for the sides and the top of the Wall) than any wall that had been built before.

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