The Wall House : Saturday, August 31, 2019

This morning we woke up and got our first daylight view of where we are staying. It’s a small village called Yuenling (probably spelled wrong- I’ll try to correct it!). The country house the Douglas family is renting is set up just as I’ve read in the Gladys Alyward book. There are double doors that open to a courtyard with two plots of ground and a walk way all the way around. Each room opens to the courtyard individually. For example, the kitchen is a separate room all to itself. You cannot pass through one room to get to another. You must go out the door into the courtyard to get to the next room. There’s a glass overhang to protect you from the rain when outside. Hannah did mention that it’s convenient when raining but pretty hot, not unlike a greenhouse, when the sun is shining brightly. Two of the rooms even boast a kang, a traditional bed that was heated underneath and the whole family would sleep together on cold nights.

Hopefully these photos can help you piece together what I tried to explain with words.

Doors leading into the house.

When you look left...

Looking right

Courtyard/doors opening in. 

Our room/en-suite!

Kang bed-quite large!


In the courtyard this opens up under the kang bed.  This is where you would feed the fire so you’re not bringing sticks inside the room. 

Freya, the Douglas’s seven-year-old daughter took Trent and me to a lookout spot that she and her sister, Iona, found their first time at the house. 

Freya shows the way!



Amazing, terraced walls. This whole area has walnut trees that the villagers were harvesting that day. They have long sticks that they thwack the trees with to get the nuts down and then they collect them off the ground by hand.



A Chestnut



Grove of walnut trees.

The Lookout Point. It was a stunning view and my iPhone photograph does not do it justice.

After several cups of coffee for me and a chocolate filled croissant (imported from Iran... not something we see at home) we got ready for the real hike.

 We had an unbelievable opportunity to hike a very rugged and unmaintained part of the wall. Hannah made it sound easy by saying her mother who’s 72 did the hike. It was extraordinarily adventurous.

**Edited to say, I had the ENTIRE post written beautifully and the Internet connection cut out when publishing so only the first portion was saved. I’m now too tired to fully rewrite the rest so I apologize in advance for the poor descriptions.**

Had to stop to visit the chickens. 

Almonds drying on the sidewalk. 

Some very impressive village gardens.

Ready!! (And how cute is Kai and their weekend dog, Oreo). 

Feeling confident!

A long way up!!

The views just got better the higher we climbed. 

Stunning! But photos just cannot do it justice!

Took a break halfway up for some much needed refreshment. I was so impressed with their girls on this hike! It was very demanding and while a scraped leg early on dampened some spirits both girls made it the whole way! Well done, girls! I’m not gonna lie, I’m glad I didn’t have to encourage my daughters up the mountain that day. 

Hannah talked a simple game whe she mentioned her mother taking this hike. Parts of it we were practically crawling, using hands and feet to get up. It was a scramble many times to make a steep portion. It was truly exhilarating!

The most thrilling part really was when, during a time where you have to put a foot in a crevice, grab hold of a rock above and hoist yourself higher than my head to the next perch, we saw something. Hannah, Trent, and I all yelled at the same time, “Callum! Callum! Callum!” He was about to put his hand on a rather large snake on the rock wall. Our shouting made him look at us and caused the snake to jump/fall onto his arm. He quickly brushed it off but it came slithering quickly back on the path towards us! Hannah said in her Bristish accent, “This doesn’t make me happy right now.”  The Queen herself couldn’t be more calm and dignified in such circumstances. What an honor to know royalty. ;) 

Almost there!!

Scrambling our way up!

(Can you spy Callum in the lookout tower?)

Victory!

The way down was slippery and steep! 

So many stairs! My legs were really shaking at this point. Thankfully there was a shop on the way down where we got waters and I got a mango ice pop. Callum is fond of the pea flavored ice cream/popsicles. Trent tried it but thought it was disgusting. 

Back in the village we at the most amazing meal at a shop/home. 

The twice fried eggplant was incredible. We couldn’t stop eating it!

My dear Hannah and me! We were able to connect to WiFi briefly here and could watch two videos of Heidi that had been sent to me. It was so special to be able to share this moment with them. Heidi is crawling, friends! Really, really well. Not only that, she’s standing alone and can even get herself back onto her feet when she goes down. It won’t be long until she’s walking. 

The rest of our afternoon and evening were spent resting and chatting. Callum barbecued for us that evening and Hannah made a lovely salad. We went to bed early after listening to someone in the village have a blasting karaoke party. We learned many Chinese love Karaoke. Who knew?

The Douglas sisters keeping us entertained with jokes at dinner. 

It was a great, great day!