The past two days

Wow, I have a lot to update you on. Last night there was no cell phone service at our camp ground so I've been unable to blog until now. Well anyways, here it goes. So since I last blogged we started our day checking out of our hotel and on to the bus for a little drive. On the bus we practiced "Shoalin Shoalin", a song that we will be singing on our last day at the Shoalin School as a sign of appreciation at our departure celebration. The song did not sound that great, but, with a little more practice we will become pros. After our song session we watched a movie and I took a small nap and in a short while we were at our first destination, Dragon Boating. The villiage that we were in was georgeous as we trecked towards the lake we got ready for our competition. Our group split into two teams and had a small briefinh with our coach. After that it was time to load in the boats and go. The boat was like a long thin row boat with 5 rows and a Dragon face on front and tail on the back. Before starting the race, the teams made a bet that the losers set up the winners tents at camping, thankfully that bet was not upheld. The two teams rowed with all of our might, but, saddly, my team lost. We were defeated with pride and then went on our way to a beautiful Chinese lunch right by the lake. It was beautiful and very delicious.

After our meal it was time to get. back on the bus and go to the Gubeikou Village. This village is located at the foot of the Great Wall and is home to people from 19 different parts of China (there are 54 in China). The villagers welcomed us with a traditional Chinese dance wearing their nicest clothes and dancing with fans. The dance was beautiful and as they finished they asked our group to join in and taught us part of the dance. After our dance session we started a tour of the village and saw some beautiful buildings that date back to thousands of years ago. Half way through our tour we were told to turn around and look. Behind us was a section of the beautiful Great Wall. I could not believe that I was looking at one of the seven wonders of the wall and that in just one day we would be climbing it. We continued walking through our tour with the thoughts in our head of the upcoming adventures. We finished our walk and saw this are filled with huge white tents. We didn't think we would be camping in these nice, premade tents because we were prepared to rough it. With little surprise, these were not our tents for the night. Instead, they were our reasturant for dinner. The tent is called a Mongolian Yurt, it is a large round tent for a feast. We entered and were presented an array of foods on a lazy susan. I haven't really shared this yet, but, so far almost every single meal has been served on a huge glass lazy susan and we each take what we want from the 10 dishes in the middle and put them on our plates. Anyways, we ate some really good Chinese/Mongolian food and then had a special surprise. At the end of our meal we had two Mongolians present a song to us. One was a singer and one played a special two stringed guitar. We had no clue what they were saying but it was very entertaining. Another tradition is to have a huge drinking celebration. We all participated and took three shots (of water lol) each while our preformers were singing. It was a very fun time that we all had in the yurt.

It was time now to go from one tent to another. Our group put away our last equipment and gathered our stuff to begin our camping experience. We hiked for about 20 minutes and arrived at our campsite. Our campgrounds were absolutely stunning. We were 100 feet from the Great Wall under the stars of China. Everyone grabbed a tent, sleeping bag, and a head light (sortof like a miner). We all set up our tents with surprisingly little difficulty and before long it became dark. Our group bonded a little before bed and then got tucked into our tents for our upcoming big day.

5:00 this morning the whistle blew to wake us up. We had to pack up our tents and gear and prepare for the 10 km hike ahead. The group finished a quick, bagged, breakfast, stocked up with water bottle and were on our way. This hike was no easy stroll; the part of the wall that we hiked is right before a restricted military area and, for that reason is untouched by tourists. In fact, other than the last kilometer we did not see any one else anywhere on the wall. So, the first part was an uphill hike on the mountain for a little while. After some time we began our first encounter with the Wall. We climbed up the steps and were in awe over the sights around us, it was breath taking. The next leg of it was straight across narrow paths on the top of the wall. We would constantly pass views of the Chinese mountains that were sensational. Never in my life could I imagine that I would be doing this. We continued on the wall through thorns, cramps, sweat, and pain and got to our rest stop about two hours and 3 km later. At the stop, we restocked with waters and began the next part of our trek. As I said, we were hiking a military section of the wall, because of this, it is closed up to the public. We took the jagged, rock steps down and began our walk through the mountain side. The path was very narrow and thorny and had views, as well, that were dazling. Part of our walk took our group through huge corn fields that linned the mountains very thickly. It was a very interesting walk that most people do not experience. After an hour or so on ground we approached the wall and walked along side it for a little while. Then the fun part began, I litterally scaled the Great Wall. We all took our turn climbing up through the cracks in the wall and got back onto the wall. It was a thrill to climb the wall and we only had about another 4 km to go. The rest was still narrow and ruggid but absolutely georgeous. Eventually, by the time I was swimming in my own sweat we arrived at the less tretorous, more tourist part of the wall. I could not have been happier then to be there. It was a very physically exhausting day that was so difficult. Nonetheless, we all fought through the pain and finished the hike together as a group.

It was truly a once in a lifetime experience and no matter how ehausted I was, I was so proud to have finished. We ended our afternoon with a relaxing lunch and then a bus ride to our next hotel. The hotel is very luxurious and will be a pleasant place to relax after the most amazing hike of my life. I will update you again tomorrow after we are at the Summer Palace.