Simatai Great Wall චාරිකා

We had a wonderful day visiting the Great Wall, and Susie made the whole experience feel smooth and welcoming from start to finish. We were given clear information and took our time visiting. The village was beautiful, the food was delicious too. We left feeling relaxed and well looked after.

I had a very nice day today at the Great Wall! Angela gave me a lot of tips to avoid long queues, so I was able to visit the East and West side in one day, plus getting lunch afterwards! I feel like it is a very recommendable trip for everyone who wants to go to the Great Wall for one day, especially as a solo traveller! :)

Our trip was on 7th Oct and thankfully no crowd. Gubei water town is really beautiful and we walked through the town with canals, Yongshun Dye House, had a lot of food at the food street - fried radish cake was the best, spicy sour noodles, spicy lamb skewers, blindbox icecream. We also walked to the church at the hill top for a near sunset view of Gubei town. The main highlight was going to Simitai Great Wall twice, day and night. We bought separate cable car trips for both. For day, we took the difficult climb to Tower 8 and walked to Tower 11 and back to Tower 8. The views were magnificent you can also see the lake at Tower 9. For the night climb, we took the cable car at 6pm (after soaking our feet at the footbath too!) and walked to Tower 5 and 6 to enjoy the illuminated great wall and also a nice night view of Gubei Water Town. This is definitely a not to be missed day trip if you are visiting Beijing. Simitai is very steep at some parts so visiting Mutianyu first is good too.

This was a great trip, the water village is beautiful. You can add on extras such as taking a boat to the eating street in the main area, shuttle, return cable car tickets to the Great Wall. The opt-in lunch is a hot pot. It wasnt too crowded and quite peaceful at both the Wall and village. The wall isnt as maintained as the others, but good to see its original state.It does take about 2 hours each way, but worth it. The Great Wall is open either for a morning session until 5pm, then for the evening session from 6pm which is lit beautifully for a smaller section. Bring good footwear and sun protection.

jimmy was the guide. he is knowledgeable and explained quite afair bit esp on the history of the wall. though dinner wasnt provided, he made an effect to arrange for dinner at e water city before we emarked on simatai section for sunset and night view of the great wall. the 2hrs drive was smooth. thank u Jimmy and driver.

It was a very long and fulfilling day, from 8.30am meet up till drop off at 10.30pm. Our group of 20pax were mostly Europeans, 3 Japanese, 2 Taiwanese and us 2 Singaporeans. Very worth it as the views of these "wild" sections of great walls are really amazing, some parts on the wall have very steep steps and it was tough to walk, not recommended for elderly and kids. There are not many domestic tourists here as compared to Badaling or Mutianyu (which are more accessible). You have to do this once, while you still can! Memorable.

We did a tour to Jinshanling section of the Great Wall today and our tour guide was Jimmy. We highly recommend Jimmy as a great guide. We have two 6-year old daughters and Jimmy was so kind with them and went at a pace which was suitable for us. Great communication and very professional and knowledgeable!