On a beautiful day we went out for a walk with the Girl Scouts, visiting a village at the end of a long valley in the mountains and doing a loop hike in the hills behind the village.

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We followed the old pilgrims trail over the hills from Miaofengshan to Dajue Temple, finishing with a look about the temple.

Click through to see 20+ photos from the hike, including hills full of blossoms, the donkey family and the temple tour.

On this visit to the Gubeikou Great Wall we started seeing signs of spring in the hills, with buds and blooms all through the hills around the wall.

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See 21 photos from our hike from Jiankou over to the Mutianyu Great Wall—unrepaired ‘wild’ Great Wall, the repaired section at Mutianyu, and tons of peach blossoms in the hills.

Late March and early April is one of the best times for hiking in Beijing – the temperatures are mild, and we start to see the blossoms of the wild peach and apricot trees in the hills.

On this outing we hiked the Great Wall at Huanghuacheng, starting by the reservoir at the restored end and hiking over to the Walled Village at Yaoziyu.

Click through to see 14 photos from the trip.

See 23 photos from a hike along the Middle Route of the Switchback Great Wall—grey skies but good views, especially of the wild peach flowers.

We did an easy hike around an old village before taking a tour at Tanzhe Temple—see 15 photos.

See 16 photos from a fun ramble through the Huairou hills that passed by abandoned villages, wildcat mines, and one of the Ming Tombs.

The Great Wall Spur is one of our favourite moderately-difficult ‘wild’ wall walks, a short but steep hike up and down an unrepaired stretch of Ming Dynasty-era Great Wall.

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Sometimes, in March, Beijing gets a late fall of snow. We’d scheduled this hike just in case, because it’s a fun walk in the snow – not too steep, nice and long.

We missed the snow by one day! There was a heavy fall the day before, but with air temperatures well above freezing point most of the snow had already melted by the time we got there. Still, there was some snow left in shaded areas, and we still had a fun hike.

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We didn’t quite believe the weather forecast for this hike. It said there might be a chance of sleet and snow in the afternoon. No way, we thought. Indeed, the forecast was incorrect – it actually snowed heavily all day, and we almost got stuck in the hills when the motorway closed down. All ended well though, and all the snow on the Great Wall was an awesome sight.

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The Big West section of the Jiankou Great Wall is a relatively easy walk. The trail going up through woods to the Wall was gentle, with short, steep parts on the Wall itself. Once we passed the highest part, the climbing down was not too difficult.

It was both lucky and unlucky for the group. Lucky as it was the first snow Beijing has had for the cold season and without a doubt, the last one, which produced beautiful views and clean wet air; unlucky as the snow made the path so much more slippery. It was great fun – click through to see the photos!

See a set of 20 great photos from our hike from Jiankou over to the to Mutianyu Great Wall—blue skies, long views, and photos of both repaired and unrepaired wall.