The Great Wall’ker

I spent yesterday making and uploading pictures for the next stretch, and didn’t go to bed until 5am.

As I have decided to walk shorter distances the next few days, I waited until the afternoon before setting off.

Some crucial Autumn months are coming now where I need to get as far as possible. When my second winter along the Great Wall arrives, it is going to get very cold indeed.

The large keyboard on my phone has gone wonky. It skips some letters and triples others. Lately, you as a reader have not had daily reports for a long time. Because of the phone problem I am going to cut down on the frequency of these reports to prioritize sleeping, eating and walking. I don’t know how often the reports will be. If I can buy a new phone with a good keyboard they may be less often but longer.

13 kilometres today

Message to brother Jon. Ba gutta slå på brannmuren igjen igår. Hvis oppdatering ikke fungerer får vi se mer på det om ca 7 til 10 dager.

I returned from Beijing to base camp in Zunhua on Saturday. The bus ride was surprisingly fast and comfortable. No queues, no smoking inside the bus - all went to plan. I hope that is a good sign for the rest of my walk.

On Sunday I walked 15 kilometres by the Great Wall. It felt good to be back, and I set off up a steep and long hill on the Great Wall. After only a few minutes, I was gasping after air. Looks like the forced six weeks of rest have had quite an impact on my stamina. But I don’t think it will take too long to get back in super duper shape.

It felt good to have the Great Wall under my feet again. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and it got well over 30C. There was a slight wind and unlike July and August, the wind actually cools you down now. I had decided not to overdo things, and when I reached the construction site of a 8 lane motorway, I decided to walk on it to a place where I could get back to Zunhua. The guys working on the massive motorway said it went all the way to Shenzhen which is the next door neighbour of Hong Kong! I was impressed.

There have been some media articles lately about never ending queues on Chinese roads. With such a growth in the traffic and such a large population, it is hard to keep up with the road building. But China is probably the place on earth right now where most new roads are being built.

The day after the walk my foot, or big toe joint was more sore than usual. I have decided to wait until tomorrow to push on. Have been studying the maps for the next stretch. It will take me past a section of the Great Wall that my brother, two friends and I visited 12 years ago. The place is called Panjiakou and is very special because the Great Wall (and lots of small villages) have been submerged by water from a large dam. 12 years ago, we stayed a couple of nights at Panjiakou and made friends with a Chinese family. I hope they are still living there!

My agonisingly slow 6 week wait is hopefully coming to an end. I want to return to walking the Great Wall. The mending process was so slow the first four weeks, that I thought it might be something more serious than ‘just’ a fracture. Luckily, the foot has recovered a lot faster over the last two weeks.

The winter comes quickly here, and the area I will be walking during the last part of this walk is between North-Korea and Siberia. So the sooner I get going, the better.

I plan to return to the Great Wall this week, and test it with some real walking in proper Great Wall terrain.

The pictures under show slices of my foot from an MRI taken a month ago. As you can see - the foot is a fairly complex piece of machinery and in many ways I am very grateful that they have both done as well as they have. It’s a nice coincidence that today’s quote is:

The human foot is a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art.
Leonardo Da Vinci

I have added 8 new videos from January this year when I was walking close to the Yellow River. You can see the videos here on the Great Wall Route page.

The videos are located to the left of the current map view. Zoom out by clicking on the minus sign on the map and pull the map to the left to find the new videos. Click on the red camera icons to see them. Yellow icons are old videos.

To see exactly where the video was recorded, zoom in by clicking on the plus sign on the map. You can zoom in a long way, and the details on the map are often pretty impressive.

Thank you very much for the supportive comments and mails I have received lately. I have taken the time to eat a lot of good food, and organize all the pictures from the walk. Quite a task, although not quite as challenging as walking the Great Wall.

The foot is mending ever so slowly. Not as much pain now as a week ago, but I’m still favouring my right foot, and keeping the walks short. I hope it keeps on mending at the same rate the following week.

Tomorrow I will start writing more about the equipment I’ve been using while walking the Great Wall. Thanks for the hint Bryan.

Wishing you all a good weekend!

Sorry for not writing sooner. I have been to the doctors office the last three days, and saw little point in writing anything until it was more conclusive.

On Monday I went to a clinic in Beijing and had my foot examined. The doctor recommended an x-ray. The results came in the same day. They were inconclusive and therefore I went for an MRI scan on Tuesday. I went back again yesterday to get the results. Doctor Sarah - whom I have been seeing - brought along doctor Alannah who is an expert on feet. Thanks to both of you for all the help and advice you have provided!

The bad news:

• Left 1st phalange is fractured and bruised
• The big toe joint has effusions
• The area has soft tissue damage

The good news:

Alannah asked me to bring along the shoes I have been walking in, and examined them and my feet carefully. She said that my biomechanics are good. That means my walking style is not putting bad or incorrect pressure on my feet which leads to more injuries.

I was hoping there was no serious injury. After seeing no substantial recovery the last two weeks however I was half expecting this. It is hard to say exactly how long the recovery time for an injury like this is. Normally it should take approximately another 4 weeks.

This is bad news for my progress of course. The truth is that I want to see this walk through. This is an old dream, and one I have been living for a long time. So I will wait the time it takes, and then continue walking the Great Wall.

Last week there was an article about the walk in a newspaper called Beijing Today that you can read here.

Sorry for not writing sooner, but at this stage, there isn’t that much ‘news’. Thank you all very much for the nice words of encouragement that I  have received lately. Much appreciated.

The last week the swelling in the foot has gone down. The flexibility of my big toe has improved a little every day, but moving it upwards causes a lot of pain in the big toe joint. I have spent time reading up on march fractures, stress fractures and learnt a lot about the bones that make up our feet. I have also spoken to a couple of doctor friends about it - thanks Andrew and Brynjar!

The bottom line is that it may be a fracture, or it may not. Fractures like this can be difficult to diagnose. I plan to go to Beijing tomorrow and have it checked with x-ray and/or MR. Up until now I have been in Zunhua giving the foot plenty of rest which is what it needs in either case. I’m hoping it is a soft tissue issue.

I remain pretty relaxed about the situation although it is the last thing I wanted. There is no need to use a lot of energy worrying about something I have no control over. I’ll let others do that… Time will tell, and the show must go on!

Will write more when I know more. Until then, there will be a new picture each day!

On the last day of the previous stretch I managed to bang my left foot hard against a rock. At the time, I just said some words I will not repeat here, and walked on. It was painful, but I was keen to keep up the speed.

The day after, which was the first day of rest in Zunhua, I noticed a slight pain in the joint at the base of my left big toe, but I didn’t think much about it. The day after that it was painful and swelled up. So painful in fact that I was having a hard time walking naturally.

I have been doing a lot of thinking the last days, wondering if it is a fracture, or just the tendons and muscles reacting to the impact against the rock. Of course I have also been thinking a lot about what consequences this might have to the walk. It is a bit ironic that one big toe, in a worst case scenario, can potentially stop an entire walk.

Anyway, today the toe seems to be getting slightly better, so I hope that means there is no fracture, and that it is on the mend. I have been taking anti inflammatory tablets lately to help it along and reduce the pain. This is of course the last thing I wanted now, but bad things happen now and again. I decided there was no point in writing about the injury until I knew a little more about how serious it was.

Well - I hope this soon gets better, and I can get back to walking the Great Wall! Will keep you posted.

After a good nights rest and breakfast from my hosts, I was ready to move on. Duan Cai Yan has done a lot of hiking and wanted to walk together with me the first section of the Great Wall east of Daankou. It was just as hot as the last 4-5 days, so we got off to an early start. Walking up the steep slope was hard and slow going.

Duan Cai Yan and Wang Hao Zhen in front of their house and pharmacy. The brick structure to the left is the shower.

The Great Wall here is different from what I have seen before. It is about 4-6 metres high, and the width varies from 4-5 metres to less than two. The most fascinating thing was the local building materials that were used. Large yellow and gray rocks that were not necessarily square, with mortar in between. Unfortunately it was yet another misty day, so the view was not as spectacular as it could have been.

There was lots of vegetation on the Great Wall and around it. It took a long time to get past sections where the foliage was so thick that it was literally a step at a time. There were a lot of loose rocks and my walking stick saved me several times. It would have been easier without the rucksack with four litres of drink in it. After an hour of hard work, Duan Cai Yan bid me farewell and returned to Daankou. Thank you for the company Duan Cai Yan!

As I walked on, the bushes, foliage and undergrowth got thicker. Often, I had to use the walking stick to check the ground before stepping down as it was covered by plants. The ground was anything but flat, and I didn’t want a fall. There were plenty of thorns too. It got worse and worse as did the heat. After having cut myself several times trying to get through a section of dense bushes, I stopped for a rest. I had been on the go for more than two hours, but covered less than two kilometres. On average I was covering about 900 metres per hour. I knew it was going to get a lot hotter and found out that I didn’t want to go on walking through the thick foliage at this speed. Instead, I retreated down a slope, found a small path, and walked back to Daankou. From there I followed a dirt road just north of the Great Wall.

These last days have been pretty hard. The heat is the worst as it affects me more than I would like. Towards the end of today, I decided enough was enough and needed some rest.I was only about ten kilometres from Zunhua and was able to get a ride from a very nice woman I met just south of Shapo Yucun.

23 kilometres today

Sorry for not writing the last couple of days. The going has been a bit tough. Seems like 34C and 80% humidity is starting to get to me. Now that I’m out of Beijing Municipality, I have to switch to the Norwegian Sim card to write entries, and lately I have been more concerned about sleep.

I will write more soon

Today was very hot too. And misty and humid. Because of the intense heat, some of the days feel a bit blurry. I notice that it affects my mental awareness a bit, and because I sometimes am forced to walk along trafficked roads, I listen to audio books just to ‘get away from it all’ for a while.

Eastern Qing Dynasty Tombs

The highlight of the day was the visit to the Eastern Qing Dynasty Tombs. These tombs are amongst the largest and best preserved tombs in China. They are devoted to the rulers of the last feudal empire in China - the Qing Dynasty from 1644 to 1911. I am walking the Ming Dynasty Great Wall which is the Dynasty that preceded the Qing Dynasty. The Qing Dynasty was followed by the Republic of China.

5 emperors, 15 empresses, princes, princesses and a large number of concubines were buried here. The tombs take up an area of about 80 square kilometres. The layout of the tombs and surrounding park areas were very nice and gave associations to the Forbidden City. Some of the buildings were in need of repair, but that added to the feeling of age gone by. I got some good photo opportunities although it was a foggy day. One of the tombs had absolutely no visitors, and the feeling was a little bit eerie.

I walked on for a little while, and then found a spot to rest under some trees. Very hot, humid and no wind. I was not going to walk the hottest couple of hours of the day. I followed small roads and dirt roads close to the remains of the Great Wall. My goal for the day was Daankou which lies in a pass by the Great Wall. Da an kou translates to Big peace pass.

It got dark before I got there. Less than a kilometre from the village, I heard several barking dogs and hoped they were chained up. They were not. Two dogs appeared out of the dark on each side of me. One of them kept a little distance, but the one on my left hand side got too close for comfort, so I gave it a good old whack with the point of my walking stick. Don’t like doing this, but in the dark I was not taking any chances. It yelped, and kept its distance after that.

As I entered the village, I asked people if there were any small guest houses I could stay at. Everybody shook their heads. They I saw a small pharmacy and thought I might as well get some more plasters for my feet. In the heat, and with the fairly long distances, I have started getting blisters again. After buying the plasters, I asked the owners of the place about a guesthouse, but they too said there were none. They were very kind and asked me to sit down while they made some phone calls to look at the possibilities. Perhaps they saw that I was shattered.

After some phone calls, they very kindly offered me to stay on their bed. I was relieved. I had my tent with me, but sleeping in it in this intense heat would be just as much torture as walking long distances during the day.

Most houses in the area have devices on the roofs for using solar power to heat water during the day, and showers connected to these. It felt quite exotic to take a shower at night outdoors with a candle light! When I was finished, I got to eat a very nice supper with the couple.

My hosts were Wang Hao Zhen and Duan Cai Yan. They set up their pharmacy in Daankou four years ago. They had a nine year old child who lived with their parents about an hours drive away. In the evening we sat talking, and as they had a computer and internet we used the Google translator whenever we were stuck for words in either direction. Thank you very much for being so kind to a tired and dirty traveller!!!

33 kilometres today

Today started with a visit to Huang Ya Guan Great Wall (Yellow cliff pass). This section of the Great Wall gets it’s name from the yellow colour of the rocks surrounding the pass. It has been commercialized, and tourists can walk west or east from the pass. I decided to walk westwards. It was a very misty and humid day, so unfortunately not good at all for taking pictures which had been part of my plan. The walk was hard, and as it got hotter and hotter, I noticed how my body was working harder and harder to keep me cool. When the temperature is in the mid 30’s centigrade and it is very humid and no wind, the body really doesn’t have that much leverage to cool itself down.

When I got close to the top, I sat down to rest and cool down. The Huang Ya Guan Great Wall was first built by the Northern Qi Dynasty (550-557) as was the case at Gubeikou. It too was strengthened by brickwork and watchtowers more than 800 years later during the Ming Dynasty period. In the mid eighties it was rebuilt so that the brickwork today appears to be ‘perfect’ as opposed to the Gubeikou stretch which is original.

Anja and Alba to the left on the Huang Ya Guan Great Wall

On my descent, I ran into two foreigners. Alba from Spain and Anja from Poland. They were sitting resting in a watchtower, and it wasn’t hard to join them as it was very hot. They were both here as summer students learning Chinese in Tianjin. They were both of the chatty type, and I was introduced in to the world of eternal studentship with the aim of always searching for the next scholarship so that one could go on studying. When we got to the bottom, we had a drink and ate together. It was good to speak English again.

Walking the Great Wall any further than the rebuilt sections is very dangerous here, so I went south, and continued my walk on small roads and dirtroads eastwards. At one place I needed to find a way from one small road to another - about a kilometre through an area that was partly agricultural, but also fairly steep. It started well, but after half way I hit a dead end, and spent a lot of time looking for a path to get on. It might sound strange that I didn’t just go bushing through the forest the last 500 metres, but the forests are very dense here, and in steep terrain it becomes extremely time consuming, so it is usually best to save time by looking for paths. The problem with paths at this time of year is that they are hidden by the foliage. After having looked around for a while I luckily met a local guy who took the time to walk with me for a few minutes and showed me a barely visible path running the right way. Many thanks to that man!

Having spent half the day at Huang Ya Guan, the distance wasn’t too long today.

17 kilometres today

Woke up to a clear blue sky. The whole day has been very very hot, and it still is now late in the evening. Have been sweating a lot, and drank too little. I thought there were some small shops along my route, but that turned out to be wrong. I could probably have got some boiling water which every Chinese household has, but it was not tempting in the heat.

Hi - do you have some cold Ice Tea?

Basically I feel like I am operating right at the border of what I can manage now. Tomorrow is supposed to be about as hot as today. Will have to set off earlier.

Saw a snake today about 4 feet long. It was coloured beautifully green, but the ten centimetres closest to it’s mouth was red, as if to say: Do not touch this end….

17 kilometres today

According to locals I have spoken to, it was 35C in the shade at the hottest part of the day. It is going to be about the same tomorrow.

I only took a small rest in the middle of the day sitting under some trees by a small river. After the rest I went on, and soon my body thermostat was working hard to keep me cool. I came to a tree and decided to spray more water on my head and the sun hat. The tree was in front of some houses, and soon there were some people around. Then a wonderful woman came with a large bowl of very cold water and said I could use it. I thanked her and was so grateful. Sprayed lots of water on all of my upper body Thank you

In front of the tunnel. You can barely see the headlamp in my left hand. I couldn't use it one my head as that was too far off the ground.

Today’s route went up a pretty high mountainside and down again. At the top there was a tunnel, and three lorries waiting in front of it. I spoke to the guys, asking how long the tunnel was. There was absolutely no lighting there, the walls and road were wet, and it looked VERY dark. If it was too long, I was planning to ask if they could take me through it with them.  After a little discussion, they said it was longer than a 100 metres. In my head, that means: longer than 100 metres, but not longer than 200 metres. (Otherwise, that is what they would have said)

They asked if I had a light, and I pulled out my faithful Petzl headlamp. Not exactly the right lamp for the job, but it was all I had. Then I said goodbye, asked then to crash in to me with a smile and headed into the tunnel. Just as I entered, one of the drivers gesticulated at the small sidewalk, and I thought he was suggesting that I walk there for my safety. Then he pointed to one of the tiles the sidewalk was made of, and pretended to throw it away. Great - I got the picture. Some of the tiles were missing, and the sidewalk was the worst place of all to walk.

I went in, and it soon got pitch pitch dark. The tunnel walls and road were very dark and wet so my ‘Three LED headlamp’ only showed what was immediately in front of my feet when I held it down at less than a two feet height. I’m not of the easily scared types, but this was so dark and creepy that I was expecting to fall through a hole any time.

There were not a lot of trucks passing by, but when they did, I hurried to the side, quickly lit the sidewalk at a foots distance and made sure there were three tiles in a row before stepping up to safety.

The tunnel went on and on. When I got out the other side, I measured it to be 900 metres long…

Charming lady by the Jiangjunguan Great Wall.

Then came a long and hard descent My feet and legs were pretty tired by the end of it. Once again it was almost dark when I saw the Great Wall again, creeping up a steep mountain side near Jiangjunguan. I asked a fantastically beautiful old lady if there was a guesthouse close by. As we were talking, two girls passed by, and one of them asked in English if she could help. She and her friend offered to take me to a guesthouse, which was very nice of them. As it turned out, the guesthouse was a fair distance south of the Great Wall. I was so tired when we got here, that I plonked down, and started stretching out my legs straight away so they will feel better tomorrow. Many thanks to the two girls! I was so tired when we got here that I forgot to ask their names!

Have eaten, taken a shower, and my clothes are being washed in a machine now. That’s great, because it means I can start completely fresh tomorrow.

33 kilometres today