China’s Great Wall is being restored one brick at a time

BEIJING — Old Cheng was waiting patiently at the bottom of a steep mountain ridge as the minivans carrying our news team snaked their way through the Yan mountains to meet him.

BEIJING — Old Cheng was waiting patiently at the bottom of a steep mountain ridge as the minivans carrying our news team snaked their way through the Yan mountains to meet him. The 70-year-old native of Huairou, a district north of Beijing, had agreed to take us up a hiking trail to one of the so-called wild sections of the Great Wall.

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Even at 9 a.m., when we emerged from our vehicles blinking in the mid-May sun, the heat was beating down hard as everyone strapped on their backpacks, checking their water supplies as often as their cameras.

For the next two hours, led by Cheng in a shiny red safety helmet and a bright blue work vest, the team made its way across a flat road that quickly morphed into a vertical, narrow dirt path strewn with loose stone and rock. Three mules ferrying bags of cement clambered past us on their own dirt track that ran shorter and even steeper up to the top.