The first visit to the wall was when there was a lot of haze due to pollution, for the 2nd visit a rain storm had moved through the day before so we had time and we went back to see the wall, which was a much clearer view.

If you think you can see in the distance with this image, frankly I had to stretch the contrast in order to see as much as you can here, so really it was not nearly this good. And the pollution here is after China started a program to reduce the pollution a couple of years prior to the Olympics, which included planting trees along some of the roads, which we saw many thousands and thousands of.

(July 2008 421)