Simatai Great Wall is a relatively short span (5.4 kilometers) of the Great Wall that is situated near the town of Gubeikou, roughly 120 kilometers northeast of Beijing. Simatai Great Wall is bordered to the west by Jinshanling Great Wall. After the Simatai section, which is considered the easternmost section of the Beijing area of the Great Wall, the wall swings southward, snaking east and west until it reaches Jiangjun Pass, about 40 kilometers, as the crow flies, due south of the Simatai section of the Great Wall. Like most of the other sections of the Great Wall, the Simatai section was refortified by General Qi Jiguang during the reign (CE 1572-1620) of the Wanli emperor, Emperor Shenzhong of the Ming (CE 1368-1644) Dynasty.
图片@视觉中国
Simatai Great Wall is known for its daunting precipices - for example, the Sky Bridge section of the Simatai Great Wall is more like a delicate cock's comb perilously attached to the bony ridge of a mountain (think of an undulating razorback), being not more than 40 centimeters wide in most places - but also for its daunting construction, which involved the use in some places of goats, since no other animal was suited for the purpose, so treacherous was the terrain (the goats had to be loaded with a single brick, albeit, a rather large, rectangular brick of the type used for parapets along the Great Wall, since too much weight could cause the animal to lose its balance and therewith its life).
图片@视觉中国
With 35 watchtowers over a stretch of only 5 ½ kilometers, the Simatai section of the Great Wall has probably the greatest number of watchtowers per kilometer than any other section of the Great Wall. Simatai Great Wall is divided into two subsections that lie on either side of a lake, Yuanyang Hu ("Mandarin Duck Lake"), which is fed by two springs, one hot and the other cold, with the result that the lake never freezes over even during the severest of winters. The subsection of the Simatai section that lies west of Mandarin Duck Lake snakes up a gently rounded mountain ridge. Here there are 20 watchtowers spread out at varying distances, in keeping with the dictates of the terrain and the need for supply depots/ added fortifications (which is the role played by the watchtowers).
图片@视觉中国
To the east of the lake, the terrain changes character entirely, with a rugged mountain ridge that resembles the "razor" back of a wild boar. Here there are 15 watchtowers, most of them located on sheer precipices, and most of them situated at an altitude of above 1000 meters above sea level. The terrain to the east of the lake descends sharply, right down to the water's edge, with no shoreline to speak of.
图片@视觉中国
Since both subsections of the Simatai section of the Great Wall descend from either side into the depression in which Mandarin Duck Lake is nestled, and since the snaking mountain ridges on either side of the lake are visible from the far end of the oblong lake, the macro view of the landscape, according to the vividly imaginative Chinese imagination, is one of two dragons leaping out of the lake, each in opposite directions.
图片@视觉中国
Source: chinatravel.com
