About a week ago I had the opportunity to return to the Great Wall and experience it in winter. It was an amazing but totally different experience from when I was there in September. This time we hiked at a section known as Jinshanling. This area of the Wall was much more developed and easier to get to the Great Wall itself. Unlike the part I had traveled to in September, which seemed as though it was untouched since the day it was built, this section of the Wall was highly commercialized, with restaurants and souvenirs for tourists at the base, and even some people selling t-shirts and charms on parts of the Great Wall. This was less enjoyable to me in comparison to my previous trip; at first it really took away from feeling in touch with the history of the Great Wall and the beauty in the surrounding mountains. Yet, it also served as a great reminder of how vast and expansive the Wall truly is…
Once I got to the top, an amazing feeling came over me as I took in a birds eye view of the mountains, now so bare but still with such great magnitude. I was shocked that it was way less cold than I thought it would be, as there was almost no wind. We ate lunch on the Great Wall (one girl brought ramen noodles and hot water in a thermos – what an icon), and looked out as it continued to snake down and over the adjacent mountains for what looked like forever. I am so happy to have now been able to experience the Great Wall post-summer and in winter!
