BEIJING (AP) -- President Barack Obama is looking ahead to talks in South Korea after one last bit of tourism in China -- a visit to the Great Wall that he called "magical."

Dressed in a winter jacket against a biting wind, Obama led a knot of people for a half-hour jaunt up the wall toward a watchtower, a restored section originally built 500 years ago.

The stop in South Korea will be Obama's first visit there and the last stop on his Asian swing. Talks are likely to concentrate on how to coax nuclear-armed North Korea to return to disarmament talks. Obama meets tomorrow with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak in the capital, Seoul (sohl).

Obama and Lee have taken a skeptical view of North Korea's recent conciliatory rhetoric to resume negotiations over its nuclear program.

Last week, the North and South Korean navies skirmished in disputed waters for the first time in seven years, sending a North Korean patrol boat retreating in flames.

The clash was a reminder that the Korean Peninsula remains a volatile flashpoint.

(Copyright ©2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)