Fast facts about the Wall: construction began in the 5th century BC and continued to the 16th century. It covers over 6,000km across China. We were on the Badaling Pass, where most of the tourists go. Even on a day when it is not that crowded, it's pretty crowded with people. But the view is unparalleled and the thought that you are walking on a piece of history is pretty awe-inspiring. And what a workout: there are stretches where you're walking up 40-degree slopes. It was glorious. The weather was perfect, about 80°F with a nice breeze.

We had two hours at the Wall which wa barely enough time to hike to the top and down again. There are two ways to go at Badaling. We went south and up to the high point. The Wall might want to think about being renamed the Great Staircase of China. It goes up and it is steep. Most of the steps are very tall, but there are a few shorter ones mixed in to make things interesting. At the top, the wall seems to stop. There is a nice stone tower and it is a good place to take a rest and look out over the Wall before heading back down.

The guidebook claims that Badaling is only good for a small glimpse of the Wall and a "I Climbed the Great Wall" t-shirt. Well, I bought the t-shirt (it costs only three dollars by the way) and even if the area was touristy, seeing the Great Wall was wonderful and beautiful no matter what section it was.

Like most tourists, we saw the Wall at the Badaling site, 70 km north of Beijing and at an elevation of 1000 m. This section was first restored in 1957 with the addition of guard rails (which did come in useful at times). Also present to enhance your 'Great Wall Experience' was the Great Wall Circle Vision Theatre (which we didn't see) and a cable car to help you to get over the trickier bits. The cable car wasn't running when we went, presumably because of the weather (it was raining). I had hoped that we would be visiting one of the less 'touristy' sections of the wall, such as those at Mutianyu, Simitai and Jingshanling Pass. However, it was still an amazing experience.

After entering at the entrance turnstile, we walked up some steps to get onto the wall itself. A sign cautioned us that to graffiti the Great wall was not a good idea. I guess 'Kathryn woz ere 9T9' was out of the question then... There was still a LOT of graffiti around, however. Chinese graffiti is kind of bizarre - because it is all in characters it still looks very elegant (even if it really does say 'Cheryl and Dazza were ere '89').

The steps brought us to the middle of the restored section and we then had to decide whether to climb to the left or the right. We had been told that the left hand side was harder so, being foolhardy and young, we went that way. I think we made the right choice. While the path was quite difficult (i.e. steep) in a few places there were certainly less people on this side. Besides, the steepest sections of the path did have steps (some of which were up to half a meter high!) and the ground wasn’t slippery, despite the rain.

In the wet weather two hours was just enough time to see around without beginning to feel too uncomfortable. But, had it been fine, I would have liked to spend a bit more time at the Wall - perhaps to scale the right hand side as well or to browse through the impressive selection of 'I Climbed the Great Wall' t-shirts and other memorabilia. (Although I don't think I could - or should - have taken any more photos!) Ultimately, I am kind of glad it rained. The fog gave the whole place a great atmosphere (although the resulting 'atmospheric' pictures are all a little grey…) and I'm sure there were fewer people there because of it.