Despite having slept five of the forty eight hours that comprised the preceding two days, I awoke after only six hours sleep to a frustrated desire to shut off my mind and plunge back into the depths of unconsciousness.

After a slow start, I hired a driver to take me to one of the less crowded parts of the great wall named Mutianyu. The walk up to the gondola, which transported me to the mountain top where the edifice was built, was the most strenuous walk of the day. Not only did the steep hill take advantage of the altitude to ensure a modest sweat was broken, but I also had to negotiate through a narrow walkway where vendors blocked my path to offer their best five English words that make up their sales pitch. They all sold the same items, none of which looked sufficiently durable to survive the flight home.

As wide as a single street lane, the wall spans across the ridge of the mountain as far as the eye can see in either direction With the Beijing smog permeating the air even at the site of the wall (a one hour drive from the city) the wall can only be seen to extend a relatively short distance. Steps are uneven on the wall keeling left and right, creating an awareness of both their age and the potential for the structure to slide down the steep mountain, ensuring death for all of its inhabitants. I encountered few tourists navigating the various slopes, most of which were from New York, bringing the US accent to China

My reading materials informed me that contrary to rumors, the wall cannot be seen from space and the wall was considered extravagant and largely ineffectual at the time it was built, leaving it unpopular until the current regime adopted it as an icon of power and tradition.

On the trip back we passed the Olympic village, a set of modern high rises with windows that reflect the hanging laundry outside the relatively impoverished adjacent apartment buildings. An enormous mesh of seemingly haphazard metal beams make up the marvel that is the new Olympic stadium, endearingly called the Bird's Nest by the locals.

With new roads, thousands of freshly planted trees, the updated airport terminal and the state of the art Olympic facilities, the city is almost ready to host the games. The missing element is clean air, which they hope to create by shutting down factories, limiting drivers to odd or even weekdays and by shooting rockets filled with rain inducing chemicals into the air. I suspect few world records will be set this year.

After a deep nap, I was picked up for a lake side dinner at the Hou Hai promenade where crowded restaurants are clustered and the smog is penetrated by the booming voices from each venue's live band. The food was excellent and the scene energetic. During a stroll we stopped in a few bars, tried candied fruit skewers and aggressively people-watched.

It seems that most of the music that people listen to is either classical or a version of soft rock. At one of the bars we stopped into the young crowd was listening to a jazz remake of Gun's 'n Roses' famed album Appetite for Destruction. They had converted head banging 80's rock and roll into music you can nap to, making it more palatable to docile local tastes.

After touring the promenade we headed back to the hotel to get some R&R.