Ancient Great Wall in Qinhuangdao

The mountains out of Qinhuangdao city turn green in the early spring, with great wall winding among. The great wall is decorated more brilliant by the warm breeze and wild flowers. The walls does not look that cold. On the foot of the great wall, the stream flows quietly, trees’ sprouts begin to come up. Wild ducks swim under the ancient bridge. An old woman is washing rice at the back of the stream. This is a scene in the village at the foot of great wall, in which the guarding soldiers’ descendants settle down. In such a wonderful day, we start our trip to explore the ancient great wall in Qinhuangdao.

►Shanhaiguan Pass and Laolongtou
Laolongtou is the easternmost of Great Wall of Ming Dynasty, which is just like the head of a dragon, going into the East Sea of China. It is the only military defense system with mountain, sea, fortress and city together on Great Wall. Laolongtou is 4 km away from Shanghaiguan Pass. Shanghaiguan Pass is a small ancient pass city. Jiaoshan Great Wall is the part which goes north from Shanhaiguan Pass. It is about 3 km from Shanghaiguan Pass city. Shanhaiguan Pass and Laolongtou are just in the city of Qinhuangdao.



Now let’s explore some ancient great wall outside Qinghuangdao downtown. Funing is a county under Qinhuangdao. The great wall in Funing County lasts for about 140 km. There are 408 bricky fortresses left, of which 171 are well preserved. The great wall in Funing County are all not renovated. With a history of hundreds years, it still keeps magnificent on the mountains. There are only 2 sections of the great wall in Funing are developed into scenic area. They are Dongjiakou Great Wall and Banchangyu Great Wall, which are open to domestic and overseas tourists. Therefore, it is easy to explore a wild great wall in Funing, such as Naxiyu great wall, Xingxingyu great wall, Jianganling great wall, ect, which are the paradise for individual tourists.

►Banchangyu Great Wall
To visit Banchangyu Great Wall, tourists could touch the real history. The great wall at Banchangyu seems very unruly, dangerous and original. Every brick and stone is from Ming Dynasty. Climbing such a great wall, tourist could feel the authentic style of Ming Dynasty. Nowadays, Banchangyu Great Wall Scenic Aare is maturing. The transportation to Banchangyu Great Wall is very good, running from north to south. Tourists could see great wall of Ming Dynasty brickkiln, Great Wall Cultural Relic Exhibition Hall, ect along the road. People could see the great wall winding on the top of the mountaion with a fortress on each peak when they stand at the foot of mountains at Banchangyu and look up to the top.
Except the original wild great wall, Banchangyu Scenic Area is one part of Liujiang National Geological Park. There are also many ancient pine trees in the scenic area. Besides, crocuta fossil is discovered at Lingxian Cave, which dates back to 11,000 years ago. Shijian Valley is another highlight of this scenic area, which as ancient crater with a history of 100 million years. In a word, Banchangyu Scenic Area is a spot to look forward to .



Tips for travel to Banchangyu Great Wall
Transportation:
here are there direct buses from Qinhuangdao Long-distance Bus Station to Banchangyu Scenic Area every day. The bus fare is about CNY8 per person. The earliest bus is at 06:50 in the morning.

►Dongjiakou Great Wall
Dongjiakou Great Wall is a little-known great wall before in Funing as it was built in remote mountains. It comes into view since the Dongjiakou Great Wall Scenic Area is open to publics. People start to realize that this great wall is the best-preserved great wall as what it was built in Ming Dynasty.
As we know, there are many original great walls nearby Beijing, but most of them fall into ruin. It is really lucky that Dongjiakou Great Wall still keeps many fortresses, wall and stone tablets for records, ect. Dongjiakou Great Wall is located about 70 km from Funing County and 35 km from Qinhuangdao. The great wall lasts for 8.9 km. More than 3000 meters of the great wall keeps fine. Only 1800 meters of it is broken. Others are among the high mountaion, without wall. This part of great wall has 2 passes, 14 beacon towers, 31 fortresses and 3 castles. It is different from other part of the great wall that each fortresses at Dongjiayu has its own name. For example, Geng’s Fortress, Sun’s Fortress, Wang’s Fortress, all of them follow people’s surname. Besides, Dongjiakou Village is the only village at the foot of the great wall where the wall guarding soldiers’s decendants settle down. The last names of people in this village are Chan, Li, Geng, Sun, Zhao and Zhang. They take care of the great wall just as what their ancestors did.

The best time to visit Dongjiakou Great Wall is from May to October each year. It is very cold in mountains in other season.




►Wild Great Wall in Funning
Except Dongjiakou Great Wall and Banchangyu Great Wall, other parts of the great wall in Funning still keep undeveloped. They have been hiding in the untraversed mountaions and forests for hundreds of years, enjoying pure air, cool weather and accompany with adorable wild animals. Therefore, they are seldom renovated or broken by human activities.