We’ve planned this hike so that we’ll be at Zhengbei Tower during the ‘golden hour’, the hour before sunset in which the sunlight gets an extra filter as it passes through more of the atmosphere and (hopefully!) gives some lovely soft and warm light for photos of the Great Wall and scenery. And hopefully we’ll miss all the traffic on the motorway coming back … fingers crossed!

This hike shows the highlights of the southeast part of the Jiankou Great Wall, covering many of the best parts of the Jiankou to Mutianyu trail.

This is a slightly easier route that avoids the super steep parts in the ‘extra’ version of our Zhengbei Tower hike. You will need to take care on some steep and tricky ascents and descents, as well as a few narrow sections.

The hike

The hike begins from a small village in the Jiankou area, and we’ll get started on an easy trail that leads up into forested hills.

At the top of the hills is Zhengbei Tower, one of the highest towers on the Jiankou Great Wall.

On our way up to Zhengbei Tower we’ll take a detour to take a good look at some of the steepest and most photogenic Great Wall in the Jiankou area.

Our detour starts on a side track that cuts across the side of the hill, taking us to the bottom of The Cliffs, one of the most dangerous parts of the Jiankou Great Wall.

We won’t be climbing the cliffs! What we’ll do is an out-and-back hike the other way, following steep Great Wall up and down the ridgelines, heading for the ‘Little Potala’ Tower.

The wall between the cliffs and the ‘Little Potala’ Tower has had some basic repair work done to stop the Great Wall crumbling away. The workers did a good job, and the repairs make it safer to hike. (Previously it was extremely difficult to hike, as well as slightly unsafe.) It’s still a little bit tricky! The footing is solid, but uneven, and care is required on the steep parts.

From the ‘Little Potala’ Tower we’ll get excellent views of the steepest and most scenic parts of the Jiankou Great Wall.

From there we’ll hike back to The Cliffs, and then take a side trail around the cliffs and back to a safer section of Great Wall.

The next stop will be Zhengbei Tower. At around 1,000m of elevation, Zhengbei Tower is one of the tallest in the area, and offers unobstructed views of Great Wall all around.

The only taller tower in the area is the one at the top of the Ox-Horn section, and after a rest at Zhengbei Tower we’ll start the hike over and up to that one!

The Ox-Horn is a steep section of wall that makes a tight curve up to a peak that’s 1,019m above sea level. We’re going to first cut across the bottom of the curve on a forest path and then hike up the steepest side—much easier to go up than down, especially on the smoother flagstones near the top. We’ll take a break at the top and hike down the other side of the curve, and then walk back to Zhengbei Tower.

After a last look at Zhengbei Tower we’ll hike down hill tracks into forested hills—about 1.8km to the finish On the way down, we’ll have views over to the other side of the valley and should be able to spot Jiankou’s ‘Big West’ Great Wall and Nine-Eyes Tower.

We’ll finish at our local guide’s guesthouse with drinks and snacks before driving back to Beijing.

Rain date

If the weather doesn’t look suitable for this hike we’d look at postponing to October 4.

Planned itinerary