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Dispatches from Beijing: Live from the Olympics, Part 3

August 14, 2008 at 1:00 PM | 0 Comments

A friend of Jaunted is on-hand for the Olympics, and she'll be doing her best to keep us posted on what it's really like for a spectator in China. Here's her report from August 13:

My family and I started the day off early with a visit to the Great Wall of China. We thought we were getting a head start arriving at 8:45 am, as we had gone to the Great Wall at Mutianyu, which is usually less crowded and more scenic than the Great Wall at Badaling. But instead, we found an unusually big crowd--due to the Badaling area being closed for an Olympic cycling race on the roads nearby.

We took the gondola up to the top instead of trekking since it was very humid. Unfortunately, it was a normal hazy day in China so the visibility wasn't that great. We walked on the Great Wall, going as far as we could: We tackled six towers.

After a visit to the wonderful Old Summer Palace--it's about the same size as NYC's Central Park--we attended our second Olympic event, Men's Greco-Roman wrestling. It wasn't an event I was dying to see, but since it's one of those traditional Olympic sports, we decided to go.

The first match we saw was between 18-year-old American wrestler Jake Deitchler and Ukranian Armen Vardanyan. Watching the event, we thought for sure that the American had won--but the referee raised the arm of the Ukranian. (Vardanyan advanced to the next round and eventually won a Bronze medal.)

Before watching another bout, I ventured out to the information booth to grab a brochure explaining the sport, competition rules, technical aspects of scoring as well as further details on wrestling and etiquette. This helped immensely as we watched two more matches, including Vardanyan's bronze medal win and the gold medal round.

Related Stories:
· 2008 Olympics Travel: Google Mapping All the Venues [Jaunted]
· Dispatches from Beijing coverage [Jaunted]

Where: Beijing, China

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Author Photo: pbb by pbb

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