Nov 8 The Great Wall

The morning got off with a slow and tragic start with the news of the death of Kurt Leswing. He was hit and killed by a drunk driver in the early morning on his way back to the ship. He was a senior at the University of Wisconsin and was from Milwaukee. It was shocking and I still don’t know how to deal with it. I kind of knew him by face and through other friends (Alyssa and Nina were close to him and were supposed to go on a trip with him that day). The ship is deeply saddened and we will be having a ceremony for him after Japan. We took an extra hour to leave for the Great Wall so that everyone could process and decided if they wanted to come or not. We arrived at the Mutianyu section of the wall and it was nice because it was less crowded and less touristy. There were the usual vendors all trying to get you to buy one useless thing after the other. They love to grab you and say “Hey Ladyyyy”. Made the trek up to the wall with Darby, Jen, Sam, and Nia (Rollins girls).  Man oh man it was a work out. It was freezing out but on the way up I worked up enough heat and sweat I actually took off my jacket and gloves. Took a couple of “picture” breaks on the way up. Finally got to the wall and it was just breathtaking. It was overcast but the seeing the wall in the distance stretching over the hills was so cool. We walked along the wall for a couple of hours. Had a lunch break and took tons of pictures. We stood on the wall, went up into towers, and met all kinds of people. When it was time to go back down we decided to take the louge down the hill that turned out to be the best idea ever! You could control your speed to go faster/slower so we of course went really fast down the windy path down the hill. The Chinese guards yelled at us…oops! Rammed into Darby at one point but it was so fun I was laughing so hard. At the bottom we took pictures with these two guys dressed up in old traditional guard gear. On the way back from the Wall we stopped at the Olympics site to take pictures from afar. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to get into them but the Aquacube and Bird’s Nest are just as amazing in person as they are on TV. To see them lit up at night would have been a real treat. The rest of the afternoon was at our leisure so the girls and I booked it to the Pearl Market. We got there just before 6pm and it closed at 7pm. So it was a shopping power hour, which isn’t easy when you are trying to get al this cheap stuff that you have to bargain for. Bargaining is exhausting!!! Kind of glad this is the last port we have to bargain. Of course I spent way too much but got a bunch of really nice gifts for people. Once the market closed we had to get back to the hotel and had the most difficult time trying to find someone to take us back to the hotel. Finding a cab wasn’t the problem at all but because the hotel was so close they wouldn’t take us because it was rush hour and they wouldn’t make any money via meter. By the 8^th cab we finally got a guy to take us. It was absolutely ridiculous! Got back to the hotel and rested and showered and then went out really late for dinner and the only thing that was still open and cheap was Outback Steakhouse. So we ordered some appetizers and cheap wine. Then went out to this club called Suzie Wong’s. Upper-class bar with good music and decent drinks. Bunch of SAS kid showed up. Headed back early to rest up for another long day.