China celebrated the seventh anniversary of its successful bid for the 2008 Olympic Games on Sunday with a giant piece of art known as the "Olympic Dragon" which stretches along the Great Wall.

With 25 days to go until the official start of the Games, Beijing has completed and tested all of the Olympic venues.

Final preparations are being made for the huge challenge of hosting the Games.

Beijing lost to Sydney in its bid for the 2000 Games in 1993, but the Chinese capital beat Paris in 2001 for the right to host the 29th Olympiad.

On Sunday, a special art project entitled "Olympic Dragon" went on display at the Great Wall's Juyongguan section to mark the seventh anniversary of the capital being selected to host the 2008 Olympic Games.

The length of the creation - 13,112 metres - represents the 1.3 billion Chinese people who are welcoming the Beijing Games and the 112 years since the first modern Olympic Games were held in Athens, Greece.

Hundreds of people, including the leaders of the overseas Chinese community, diplomats from the foreign embassies in China, and local volunteers took part in the celebration at the Great Wall.

He Zhenliang is International Olympic Committee member and former vice chairman of Chinese Olympic Committee, who witnessed Beijing's two Olympic bids.

He Zhenliang said couldn't wait to see the opening ceremony of the Games in the Bird's Nest on August 8.

"Just like working on a nice oil painting, our Olympic preparation works are at the stage of the "last touch", using the brush and do the fine-tunes and do some minor changes on the overall piece."