Basically, I go in Sha'ar Yaffo and walk to the Kotel via the Jewish Quarter.
However, last time I went to the Kotel, I had FF in a stroller, which meant I wanted to avoid the huge flight of steps between the Jewish Quarter and the Western Wall Plaza. I still took the train to City Hall and walked to Jaffa Gate, but I then did this, following the road around to the Dung Gate:
As I'd planned, this drastically reduced the number of stairs I had to climb down.
It's been a long time since I've walked this whole loop, so I was somewhat surprised when, before I got to the metal detectors and security guards at the entrance to the Kotel Plaza, I found what seemed to be a tiny entrance to a different section of the Kotel. I've read that there's a pluralistic prayer section by Robinson's Arch... was this it? There were steps, but not impossibly many, and anyway, the "stroller" was a very light umbrella stroller. Yes, it was the Robinson's Arch Prayer Section.
Here's what it looks like (not my picture):
I stayed there for close to an hour. It was a very different experience than the Western Wall Plaza a few yards away. Vastly fewer people. (While I was there, I saw a total of 8 other people in ones and twos.) Very different. Empty, but in no way "peaceful":
I've seen the Southern Wall excavations once, so I wasn't completely unprepared for the Temple Mount stones still lying where they smashed the street below, but it's still shocking. One of the people who passed through didn't manage to put what I felt into words, though all of his body language and tone matched how I felt. He tried to speak a few times before finally settling on, "How could they have destroyed it?" Not the words I feel, because I don't have any words. But the shoulders forward and chest back, curling in on self; the licked lips mouth that opens and closes multiple times, looking for words that aren't there; the drawn eyebrows and wet eyes.
It's not peaceful. Just powerful.
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