September 8, 2025
Kyle and Len overslept this morning so Ollie and I had to bang on their door to get them up. They got ready while Ollie and I went down to breakfast. Ollie dropped and shattered a plate at the buffet and he was mortified. He put his head down and ran over to hide behind me and kept saying how embarrassed he was. Went to get himself a bowl of chocolatey cereal in defeat. We went to Starbucks again this morning for another strong coffee and got the kids bunny shaped pastries. They were super cute, but filled with taro paste that the kids didn’t care for.
We drove 90 minutes to get to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall. We were dropped at the terminal where it was then a 5 minute shuttle ride to the base of the wall. We waited in an hour long line to get on the chairlift to go up to the wall, but it went surprisingly quick. The boys were first occupied with finding chestnuts on the ground and ensuring that they had equal amounts. Then they searched for centipedes on some of the shady walls and loved seeing how grossed out they made me. An older Chinese woman in line started stroking Ollie’s hair and he didn’t even notice. Vivian translated for us that the woman’s daughter told her in Mandarin, “how are you doing that you are abnormal!!” The woman asked Vivian if they were boys or girls and if we dyed thier hair or got them perms to curl their hair.
On the chairlift up to the wall, we were surprised to see hundreds of huge spider webs among the pine and chestnut trees. They were everywhere. Len would point and scream, “ANOTHER ONE!” repeatedly as we made our way to the top.
We hiked along the wall for over an hour. Since the wall was built on top of the spine of a mountain, it only has a few flat sections while most of it has fairly steep inclines/declines the entire way. Its hard to imagine that there is a marathon that runs on parts of it! We got ice cream to cool off before heading to get in the queue to ride the toboggans down the mountain.
Kyle teamed up with Len and me with Ollie for the ride down. The kids had been looking forward to this ride all day and it definitely held up. Unfortunately, we’d have to slow down at parts since the people in front of us had braked so severely but overall it was super fun.
It was mid-afternoon by the time we got back down the wall and were all feeling super hungry. We stopped at a restaurant nearby and were told they were known for their dumplings which excited Ollie. We played a bit of Uno and then ate an enormous lunch with some of our favorite Chinese foods (pork dumplings, shrimp dumplings, broccoli, Sichuan green beans, crispy chicken, white rice and Arctic Ocean orange soda). Before we sat down to eat, Vivian let us know that the roads might be closed for an extended period as a foreign dignitary would be visiting the wall. We learned that they will often close full highways at short notice to create a smooth and safe environment for government officials but much to the frustration of citizens. We were able to get on the road before they were closed but were soon directed to park in a lot off the road to wait for the official to pass by. Vivian and the driver told us they had no idea how long the wait would be and asked if we wanted to stand by the road to try and catch a glimpse of the official as they drove by. We declined and instead chose to wait in the air conditioned car. Thankfully it was less than 30 minutes wait before we were on the road back to Beijing.
After a bit of downtime at the hotel, we went out again to wander the Hutong and make good on the blind box promise to the kids. Len saw an Iron Man mask at a nearby blind box and has talked about it incessantly since the day we arrived. We’ve told him repeatedly that the odds are very low that he would get the mask but the math behind the odds went well above his head. Len ended up getting a stuffed capybara with a tennis backpack and snap bracelets on it (ha!) and Ollie a small matchbox car. After he got past his initial disappointment, Len came to love his new capybara friend whose tail would also spin when you pulled on a string on his back.
Next we walked to a jewelry shop with a tank of huge clams/oysters out front. We picked out two huge clams and the shop attendant brought over a cleaver to open them and loosen the insides. Me and the boys then picked out the pearls— more than 20 pearls per clam! The attendant only spoke Mandarin but she and I communicated via Google translate where she told me to decide if I wanted a bracelet or necklace. I chose bracelet thinking she would quickly whip up 2 bracelets— one for me and one for Len (only he and I were interested in the jewelry). She worked diligently but it took over 30 minutes to make one bracelet and we were all getting antsy to move along to our next stop. We took the rest of the loose pearls with us hoping that we will do something with them once we are home in the states. Len was especially interested in getting a necklace made “with the big purple pearl!”
Our last stop of the night was the Factory, the bar we visited the other night in Beijing. The boys were eager for more video game time and Kyle and I eager for a simple pizza and beer dinner. The boys loved playing Street Fighter and Len was the surprise star of the night winning most of the battles he played while only pressing one button and using one attack. Ollie kept saying, “This is so embarrassing to lose to a 4 year old!” We stayed at the bar til nearly 11pm before going next door to 7-11 to get ice cream bars for dessert.
