This is part of our Thanksgiving Round the World trip, you can find my initial thoughts / intro here, Flying All Nippon Airways Square Class, Flying All Nippon Airways Business Class, The Grand Hyatt Tokyo review, Touring the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan, Dueling Alliance Lounges at Tokyo-Haneda Airport, Dueling Planes to Beijing, The Grand Hyatt Beijing, and the Hyatt Regency Mainz.

For our first full day in Beijing, China we decided to take a tour of the Great Wall.  We started the day off with an early breakfast at the club lounge at the Grand Hyatt Beijing.  We had arranged a tour guide and driver through the hotel, we paid a bit more but had more confidence in the tour guide.

Tour transportation

We ended up going to Juyongguan Gate.  While it was still a bit of a walk and a ton of stairs it was more accessible and a little less crowed then the other two gates.  The tour guide spoke very good English and gave some history of the wall.  On the plus side he was able to answer our questions and we did not feel much pressure to rush.  In the early morning there were not too many people on the wall which was nice.  Though there are stairs they are not consistent in height and the railings can at times be on the short side.  Since it was a relatively clear day we could see most of the wall when we were driving up to it.

And the wall goes on.

The Great Wall

View from the top of the wall.

At the top of the wall.

After the wall we headed back to the hotel. But made a stop at the requisite jade factory.  Little pressure to buy but we did not stay to long after they explained how they did the carving.

As we drove back to the hotel they were able to drive us by the bird’s nest which was pretty cool to see too.   We were informed that they lit the area in lights at night.