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Home → China Travel Guide → Qinhuangdao Travel Guide - Shanhaiguan Trip

Shanhaiguan Trip

Shanhaiguan, or Shanhaiguan District is under the juridiction of Qinhuangdao. My account of Shanhaiguan trip only refers to "First Pass Under Heaven" - Shanhaiguan ancient pass city, and "Old Dragon's Head" - the eastern tip of the Great Wall of China. Actually the Jiaoshan Great Wall also belongs to Shanhaiguan administratively.

We took a "black" taxi to the ancient pass city - Shanhaiguan from the Jiaoshan Great Wall. We asked our local farmer black driver why there were no legal taxis on the parking lot. He answered that the legal taxis were reluctant to come here simply because they lost money running this line. And black taxis fill up the black hole naturally. So I think free market sometimes has its limitation.

The driver said that the local government had invested huge amount of money in rebuilding, repairing the ancient Shanhaiguan City. It didn't take long before we got to the famous city surrounded by the wall on its four sides. The board written with words of "First Pass Under Heaven" is hung on the east gate of the pass, actually one of its 4 gates of the city wall - east gate of the ancient city.

Built in Ming Dynasty around 700 years ago, the pass city used to be an important defence city against intrusions by the nomadic people from the north. The city was sandwiched by the Yanshan Mountains in the north and the Bohai Sea in the south, hence the name of Shanhaiguan meaning "Pass between Mountains and Sea' in Chinese. To the south of the ancient city is Laolongtou or Old Dragon's head, the north is Jiaoshan Great Wall.

We didn't ascend the two-storey tower ( "First Pass Under Heaven" ) for we had alread been there in our previous trips. In the past the pass - "First Pass Under Heaven" was the only passage coming from the northeast China to China heartland. The pass of Shanhaiguan is a square city, with a perimeter of around 4 kilometers long. The walls are 14 meters high, and are 7 meters thick. The east, south and north sides are circled by a deep, wide moat. There are drawbridges over the moat. In the middle of the pass ctiy lies a tall bell tower.

5km south of Shanhaiguan Pass stands the wall - the easternmost end of the Great Wall of China stretching 23 meters into the sea, resembling a dragon's head, hence the name of "Old Dragon's Head"- Laolongtou.. We took a local three-wheeled private taxi to "Old Dragon's Head".

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