Simatai Vacations, Simatai Vacation Reviews, Tourism Guide

Firstly apologies to all the boffins out there re the approximated map location in writing this. The website wasn't working properly and wouldn't allow me to zoom in to get an accurate location. After the walking marathon of yesterday we decided that we'd pass up the option to trek on the Great Wall from Jinshanlen to Simatai and head straight to Simatai itself where you can get onto a different part of the walf with a slightly shorter walk. We left Beijing around 7.15 with a 3 and a half ho...

For the last 4 days, I had been trying to arrange a trip to the Great Wall - with no luck. My request did not fit the mass-tourism model, I guess. I knew that I did NOT want to be stuck on the wall in the middle of hundreds of other tourists, following some flag-waving, shouting tour guide, and fighting the crowds to get a photo that made it look like I was alone. In fact, I WANTED to be alone on the Wall, as I had high hopes that this might be a some-what "spiritual" exper...