The Great Wall of China

The Perdue's had a quiet week. We got back into a routine and I feel almost caught up on everything except.... blogging.

The last day of Matt's conference was over at noon. We hired a driver and along with the Whitlock's, Kirsten and Kimberly we headed out of Beijing to the Great Wall. It was another beautiful day. It took about an hour and a half to get to the portion of the wall we were visiting. 

 This is up heading to the entrance of the Great Wall. Brynn was enjoying being carried piggy back style.

 This is the section of the wall we visited: Mutianyu. Matt knows some of the history because of an Eastern Asian class he took in college. All I know is that it is a huge wall with a lot of steps :)

 We rode these cable cars up to wall. It was a great view. A little scary, but much better than having to walk all the way up there.

 Here is view of the wall from the top. The picture doesn't do it justice. The wall keeps going in both directions as far as you can see.

 Brynn got flipped around to the front. As you can see there are a lot of steps. I was so nervous carrying Brynn and mostly concentrated on the very uneven steps.

 Brynn and me with the mountains in the background.

 Brynn hanging out on the wall. I so wish she was old enough to remember her first visit to the Great Wall. Not many people get to experience this great wonder. I did the next best thing and took a ton of pictures of her.

Brynn and Daddy taking a rest along with way.

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If you look in the middle of the picture you can see the Toboggan track that we rode down. When we got to the top, a Chinese man told us it would take an hour and a half to walk from where we got off the cable car to this spot. An English man told us it would be  a 30 minute walk. Thankfully the English man was correct and it just goes to show you there is a cultural difference on the speed cultures walk.  The Toboggan ride was the highlight of the trip. I went down with Brynn strapped to my front. It was a little scary at first, but when I got the hang of it, we had the best time. Matt got stuck behind a Chinese lady that rode her brakes the whole time, so he didn't get to go as fast as he wanted and was a little disappointed.  Matt took a video on the way down. Hopefully, I can get him post it soon. We finished the day by eating at TGI Friday's, which was right by the Olympic Bird's Nest.  The next day we visited Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City. We were all a little tired from the day before and it was very crowed. Hopefully, we can revisit these sights again when we are more rested and it is not a national holiday.