Hohhot Travel Forum

...now asking this question for the third time because the VT Inner Mongolia Forum didn't 'take' my question the first two times!

Has anyone visited the Zhao Great Wall in Inner Mongolia. I have rcently posted detailed information on two sections of the Zhao wall (in the sections on Hohhot and Beqeq) but am keen to get more information (directions, localities, accessibility) about other parts.

Also interested in the Qing Great Wall sections on the Shanxi-Inner Mongolia border at the WESTERN end (i.e. around Qingshuihe....no at the Datong end!!)

Thanks, Mark

Mark,
It is one of the sites[in English] google.com found:

http://www.travelchinaguide.com/china_great_wall/scene/inner_mongolia/

SInce you have been there for long now, ask some Chinese people helping you searching among Chinese sites, perhaps you will get some details.

Best luck!

Thanks FreeCloud,
Unfortunately local people don't even know that what they have in their village is part of the Great Wall. Many actually deny it. Even if they do, they will just point along it.....which the astute visitor can work this out for themselves.
Local tour guides in Hohhot were astonished to be shown it: they expected to see something like at Badaling.

I am looking to see if people have found the wall in specific sites. Even when you know the wall runs through a specific village it can take several hours to find the site.

The description in Travel China Guide is not really helpful (but thanks for the URL anyway).
e.g.
"From the top of the Daqing Mountain north of Hohhot, ..., one can see an ancient wall slithering along the slopes of the Yinshan Mountains which cut through the region."
The Daqing and Yinshan are a range, can be difficult to access, and the Zhao wall is on the Tumdchuan plain, not in the mountains.

Best wishes, Mark

I assume you are able to read Chinese, if so, again, search '³¤³Ç ÕÔ ÄÚÃÉ' with google.com, you will get at least this:
http://www.thegreatwall.com.cn/aboutgreatwall/history2/zhanguo/zhao/news.html

As you have already stated clearly, for any info, you have to 'dig' through from many many places online or from OLD locals who is interested in the topic (i.e., historic county journal etc etc, someone works in the 'historic preservation comm.' etc etc.

Many tour guides tourists ran into unfortunately have very limited knowledge (notice that I did not use 'info'): they simply memorize the 'official' guide speeches w/o knowing anything else (worse, not knowing what they memorized meant, as others wrote them). For such 'guides speech' book, the Wang Fu Jing foreign language bookstore sells the 5-book set (in Chinese at lesat, not sure if English version is available).

Best luck.

Freecloud,
I'm aware of the website. It is god, but sadly news doesn't get onto it regularly. The article about Baotou transport department is one that could be repeated many times. The new Baotou - Hohhot highway *seems* to cut through the Zhao wall a number of times on the outskirts of Hohhot (between Tumd Zuo Qi and Hohhot, at least).

With regard to older people in villages, my experience is that it is not the case that older people know much about historical artefacts at all. In fact, more often than not it is the village children and youths that know the landscape better. I know this sounds counter-intuitive, but it is just my own experience in a number of places in China.

With regard to the tour books, I wasn't aware that there was a 5 volume set. I have various English language "tour manuals" used by English-speaking tour guides. Most of them written in the 1980s.
I will try to get the one you mention. There are also provincial ones as well, but only in Chinese. I have the one for Inner Mongolia.
The good news is that there are some very very good Chinese guidebooks being published now (especially by Zito), and with my slow, lumbering reading I can usually make sense of most of it. It just makes it all so much s-l-o-w-e-r!!
Shanxi has produced a good detailed book, but it suffers from providing no maps whatsoever (manageable) but then makes it worse by tending to list places, with no information about their history. It just says that in X place there is A fortress, B house and C tomb. It doesn't give any background to A, B or C. At least these guidebooks are a start in getting tourists to think beyond Badaling, Guilin and Xi'an though.

- Mark

Yup, which is unfortunate. Back to the old people, not everyone aged, but once a while, there is someone who is extremely interested in his area, if you are lucky to find such, it would be great. Best luck!

Hi Mike,
It is good to find someone who is interested in Inner Mongolia. Do your interests extend further than the history of the place, or are you interested in Mongols too?
Anyway about the wall.
I have seen the remains of a wall, I can't tell you exactly which, in Chifeng district, SE inner mongolia.
I have visited this site 4 times this year, though I am going there to practice my mongol langauge and see the grasslands, i have come accross those remains.
They are fairly flat, but easilt visible and seem to go on for a while, though I didn't go far.

http://www.spiritone.com/~brucem/imar1.htm

there is a picture here of the place, so Jin Dynasty it is!

Dear John,
Thanks for the note, and especially thanks for the reference to the website. This is a really useful 'new one' for me.

The photo on the website is taken (I think) from the Jingpeng to Xilinhot road at KM52 (before reaching the Xilingol river, heading north). The stump of mountain partially visible on the right looks really familiar. If I'm right, then Dalai Nur is just out of sight to the left, and the big windmill farm is behind the photographer. I have other photos taken from the same location. Is this still in Chifeng district?

I was in Chifeng briefly in August. Nice town. I was going to go up for the weekend this autumn but never got the time. I spent some time at Reshui, Jingpeng and Daban as well. It's a great area. I keep meaning to post some more stuff on VT about this area, but haven't got round to it yet.

Kind regards, Mark

Sorry John,
Shouls also have added that I am interested in Mongolia as well. I have a specific interest in the UNESCO Xilingol MAB from a semi-professional perspective, but also the far north of Inner Mongolia and particularly the Daur, Ewenki and Oroqen minorities. Most of them are more endangered than the Giant Panda, yet get little attention.

- Mark

Hi Mike,
It is nice to find someone witht the same interests as myself , there are very few of us around.
I have been living in NE Asia for the past 5 and a half years, most of which has been spent in Liaoning. I was lucky enough a couple of years ago to have the chance to return to britain and study an MA in Mongolian Studies at Leeds University. Since returning to China, I have been actively searching for traces of Mongol culture in the Northeast, and of course travelling to Inner Mongolia as much as my time will allow. This year I have been to Chifeng 4 times, and really like the area. Daban, Keqi, the places you mentioned are all fascinating. There was a small desert near Wudan which was also wondeful.
The wall is not so far down the road as Dali Hu or the windmills. If I remember correctly, it is after a turn off to the right about 40km before the windmills.
I also am very interested in the northern minorities. I have met an old Daur gentleman in Britain, an author of Mongol history, as well as Britain's foremost expert on Daur Shamanism at Cambridge University, Caroline Humphries.
I will leave China soon, but can't wait to get back and go up north to the Oroqen and Daur autonomous districts.
Happy Christmas.