Hemp Village to Jinshanling Great Wall
Hike into Hemp Village and then up hill tracks to the western end of the Jinshanling Great Wall, and then follow the wall all the way over to the east side, taking in all the excellent views of the picturesque and photogenic Jinshanling Great Wall.
Booking info
Saturday, July 25
¥480 / ¥430 for members
Payment in advance required for this hike. More about payments
Bad weather plan—if the weather forecast looks unsafe (lightning/heavy rain/extreme heat) we’d need to change the plan for the hike. We’d let you know if there was going to be a change.
Starting the hike at Hemp Village allows us to hike all of the wall at Jinshanling with no back-tracking, from the west gate all the way over to the east side. We’ll also get views of some of the the wall between Jinshanling and Gubeikou.
The hike
We get to the start point of this hike by hiking in to Hemp Village, an isolated settlement in the hills on the border of Beijing and Hebei Province. There are about 100 people living in this valley, surrounded by hills on all sides. They mostly grow corn in this area, but in the right season you can spot hemp and tobacco, and there are donkeys, cows, chickens, and dogs about the place as well.
We might be able to drive part of the way in, but the roads get quite narrow and bumpy—maybe a bit rough for our vehicle. Easier to walk it!
Up past Hemp Village we’ll find the western gate of the Jinshanling Great Wall park area, where we’ll start the hike up to the Great Wall. We'll follow the park trails through some farmland and up along a low ridgeline to reach a trail that runs beside the Great Wall, aiming for a great lookout point..
From the lookout point we can see all of the Jinshanling Great Wall, a mostly-restored stretch with many intact and closely-spaced towers.
Much of the Jinshanling Great Wall is outside the Beijing Municipality, in Hebei Province. It’s a well-known part of the Great Wall that is in good condition after a lot of restoration work, and it is extremely picturesque, with large towers that are more closely-spaced that usual.
Not far from the lookout point, we’ll be able to pass through an archway in the wall, getting us back on to the south side. The south side is the Beijing side, and we’ll find a small door that allows access to the wall. From here we’ll be walking on top of the wall, following it to the main pass of Jinshanling.
We’ll follow the Great Wall towards the eastern end of Jinshanling. The walk is steep in places with a lot of steps – in one place it’s 107 steps up, then 120 steps down. This means it can get a bit tough on the knees, but the views make up for any temporary pains.
Once we reach the end of the Jinshanling section, we’ll be able to get good views of much of the Simatai Great Wall, including the steep eastern ridge where the famously hard-to-reach Sky Bridge and Fairy Tower are located.
We’ll finish the hike by walking down a paved park trail. This trail leads down a valley, and after about thirty minutes we’ll arrive at the bottom and meet our bus.
