大象传媒

On day four of our 11-day fundraising walk along the Great Wall of China, we have arrived in , our base for the next 48 hours, and I feel great as I've just had my first shower in a couple of days.

It's been an interesting start to the trip, from flying into the hustle and bustle of Beijing, to trekking on Monday and not seeing a single soul outside of our group.

We've had sunshine and sandstorms, but no smog, in memory of the earthquake victims, an and an unexpected beer.

We arrived in on Saturday and the first thing I noticed was that there is a lot of work going on - it's mainly cosmetic, things like roadside trees being planted, in preparation for the Olympics.

Beijing is a big big city and there is a lot of new development and it is quite apparent that it is a very modern and extremely busy place.

We have a full day to spend in the city at the end of the trip, so I'll let you know more about it when I've had chance to explore further at the weekend.

As Brits tend to do when they are abroad, though, we managed to find an full of other Brits, to watch the FA Cup final.

It was a fairly there, but don't try explaining to the driver where you want to go - it's best to have places written down.

It wasn't a particularly , but we've now left that far behind.

In fact we were in such a remote place on Monday, in the , that we didn't see anybody outside of our group on the wall.

We don't spend all our day on the wall - bits of it are in such disrepair that it is impossible to walk on it and we are forced to use alternate paths.

But during a spectacular day we trekked up about 700m in a couple of hours, including - a ladder of between 200 and 300 stone steps (I'm afraid I lost count) up a hillside.

Up on top of the mountain, we sat under in the shade of a tree to take in the amazingly endless panoramic views.

I was leading the group with one of our Chinese guides on the descent and we met a local who was sitting with a little black box at one of the .

To my surprise, he opened the box and pulled out an ice cold beer and offered me it - it turned out he had quite a few so I shouted up to the stragglers that it was first come first served.

There was a fair stampede, although I didn't tell them that there had been enough to go round all along - but , I don't know.

We ended up in a farming village which was basic, in that there were no showers and the toilets were challenging, but the food was excellent.

It was all fairly recognisable vegetables and rice, cooked in a , but not in the westernised way we are more used to.

The locals have been incredibly hospitable and while they don't speak any English and we don't speak any , I'm working on the language - I've got and so far and sign language works wonders.

With local families, we marked the nationwide in memory of the earthquake victims.

Coverage of the disaster is all over every television channel here - I've been watching pictures from our base in Jinshanlin this evening.

Talking to the guides though, they are fairly and know that it is just part of life where they live - they've had them before and they expect to have them again.

Today's section was not as strenuous - we had a bit of a bus ride and the day started off in sunshine, but a sandstorm, blowing in from the deserts of the and , enveloped the area - it's a bit like being under a big smog.

Hopefully the sandstorm will clear by morning as we've got a hard day on Wednesday with lots of steep sections and apparently a suspension bridge to get across and a zip wire to negotiate.

Mobile phone access is excellent which means I'll be back on Friday to let you know how we got on.

Steve Cram was talking to 大象传媒 Sport's Peter Scrivener