I climbed the Great Wall of China...

...and all I got were these AWESOME PHOTOS!  :)  Muir's co-worker James Xin (pronounced like "Sheen") hired a driver and accompanied us and a fourth co-worker from Bangalore named Sandeep to the Great Wall and the Ming Tombs.  We visited a part of the wall at Badaling.  About an hour away, it's the closest section to Beijing and the most visited.

The plaques just before the entrance to the Great Wall say
you're not a good Chinese man until you've climbed the Great Wall,
a famous saying of Mao Zedong. 

James pointing at something.

The side of the Great Wall facing Mongolia is higher than the side facing Beijing.  There were square openings near the bottom of the "outside" side of the wall where archers could shoot at would-be intruders.  If you look over either side, you would see that you're about 20-25 feet above the ground.  This section of the wall had been restored using modern construction techniques and the outer face was a smooth layer of concrete for the first 20 or so feet up from the ground.  So unfortunately, no, it would not be a good place to boulder.

A view in the other direction,
toward the entrance and visitors' center.

Parts of the wall were *very* steep.
I'd guess maybe a 60% grade. 

A good shot of the wall winding to the left and then to the right.

Muir's shirt was a big hit again at the Great Wall.  He got many requests from Chinese visitors for photos with him and was in scores more which were (somewhat) surreptitiously taken.

Despite prohibitions against defacing,
the Great Wall is covered in the carved names of inconsiderate visitors.

 We hiked along the Great Wall for about two hours before I had seen enough and Muir and I turned back around.  James and Sandeep continued on for another hour before we finally all met up again back at the visitors' center.  We grabbed a quick snack at a Subway in Badaling and hopped back in the chartered mini-van to visit the Ming Tombs.  On the way we made a micro-stop at The Sacred Way, a path at one end of the Ming Dynasty Imperial Tombs.

"The Sacred Way" near the Ming Tombs had pretty
sculptures on both sides of the willow-lined path.

There are several burial tombs in the Ming Tomb area and the excavation site we saw is called Dingling.  It contained the remains of the Wanli Emperor and his two empresses.

"The Diamond Wall," the original entrance used by
archeologists when the tomb was excavated in 1957.

Replica sarcophagi.

The scraps of paper on the red sarcophagi aren't litter, they're Chinese yuan.  James said that some visitors throw money on the coffins as an offering for blessings and good luck from the emperor, as one might throw coins in a fountain for good luck...a creepy, necrotic fountain.

Detail of a marble door handle
in the shape of an animal or beast head. 

Visiting the Dingling tomb was pretty quick, only about 20 minutes to walk down, through, and back out again.  Back on the surface, there were two exhibition halls displaying some of the artifacts unearthed during excavation, or rather their replicas.  Many of the items discovered were denounced and burned during the Cultural Revolution.  The official displays at the site painted a different picture.  They said things like the People's Republic of China championed the excavation efforts, opened a museum of the tomb to the public in 1959 (which I think was true) and did their utmost to preserve the historical site, and named times when it was listed on various national and international world-heritage registries.  I think this was a pretty sugar-coated account of the events to say the least.