Sunday, September 28, 2014

China into Russia

China Southern flight CZ3215, bound for Xian, China
Southern doesn't come with the highest raps, so we have been pleasantly surprised today. Food has been average, but it is airline food after all. The crew was pleasant and had enough English to deal with passengers' needs. While there was a hiccup at our transfer to the Xian flight, it was a minor disruption. Delays have plagued Chinese airports throughout 2014. Part of the problem has been tagged to military bans on flights during exercises, but the sheer traffic through major hubs must also be pushing the boundaries of current infrastructure.
The 2 1/2 hour leg to Xian was a pleasure. Even at the end of a long day, we were extremely happy with the service and the state of the plane. Final score for China Southern - 7/10, which beats our rating for Qantas of 6/10.


17 September 2014, Bell Tower Hotel, Xian
For over a thousand years, the "Silk Road" was a major trade route between Xian and the Middle East, long before Marco Polo made it to China. Today, Xian's inner city walls remain intact, albeit restored, but that is just about all that remains of Xian's former glory.
Many in the West would not know of Xian. Bigger than New York, London and Paris, larger than the combined population of all Australian State capitals, Xian, with a population of around 15m, is only a second level Chinese city. The real biggies have more than 20m people.
Today we did a bit of a reconnoitre, out to Bei (north) Xian station to pick up our tickets for the High Speed train to Beijing, then back to Xian Central to check out where we catch the bus for the Terracotta Warriors tomorrow.



Language can be a problem in China, but it has never really caused us much grief. There is always somebody around who can help. The Chinese are not as helpful as the Japanese, but the young people in particular will often chip in, like the young guy who was just as lost as we were, looking for Central Station. "Follow me," he said and strode off. Not particularly friendly, but it was a help nevertheless.



Our previous China blog was full of "Oh, wow!" statements about China's development, so on this short visit, we'll limit it to just one "Oh, wow!" Even way out here in the Chinese "wild west" the development is amazing!

18 September 2014, Bell Tower Hotel, Xian
Special Tourist Bus 5, also known as local bus 306, was our "coach de jour" for the hour-long haul through the suburbs of Xian to visit the Terracotta Warriors. Having checked out the bus location yesterday, we had no problems getting under way.
A couple of local farmers came upon the buried army of the Emperor Qinshihuang while sinking a well in 1974. Over 7000 statues of men, horses and chariots have been unearthed to date and the work continues. Each individual warrior is different and crafted in full scale. The technology, manufacturing skill and artistic expertise required for this enormous task is simply staggering. Some of the skills used were lost for almost 2000 years. For example, many of the weapons found at the site were chrome coated. This technology was not rediscovered until 1937 and not finally refined until the early 1950s.



19 September, Train G654, Xian to Beijing
Sitting on 300 kph, we will do the 1200 km trip today in less than 5 hours. As we get further north, the smog is closing in so that the thousands of skyscrapers that line the tracks can only just be discerned. We heard on CCTV (Chinese English language TV) that new urban centres are being built at a rate sufficient to re-house the population of Rome every week. The same program also claimed that 2.5 kms of railway and 200 km of new highway are constructed every day. While this sounds a little like Communist Cold War era exaggeration, from what we have seen there could well be some truth in the claims.
Our arrival in Beijing coincided with peak hour on the subway. Our trip from Beijing West station to our hotel was made more difficult by the amount of luggage we have. Last time we were in China it was early Autumn and we survived comfortably with small carry-on bags. Faced with a warm Asian leg and cool to cold European leg, we are toting clothing for all possible climatic eventualities in large backpacks, making us turtle-like and dangerous to by-standers when we turn suddenly.
This trip is the most highly-planned that we have ever undertaken. While that may sound like a good thing, for us it is a bit of a nightmare. All it takes is one missed train or delayed bus and we are in strife. Our first concern was the train ticket that was to be awaiting us at the Beijing International Hotel today. But aside from some nervous moments finding the hotel, all was well.


20 September, Train G23, Beijing to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
Settled in our fairly luxurious two berth cabin, with shared toilet, we are enjoying clear blue skies and very little pollution as we head across rural north-west China. Away from the big cities, the Chinese countryside is quite beautiful. Small villages dot the rolling hills with the vistas of ugly highrise only rarely intervening. Much of the land in the east is intensively cultivated, but now we are further west, open plains have become the norm. Poplar trees are just starting to turn, the harvest is in and small flocks of sheep graze among the haystacks. What a vastly different world it is to the one we left just a few hours ago.


21 September, Gobi Desert, Mongolia
A descendant of Genghis Khan tears across the open desert on his motor bike as our bleary eyes adjust to the early morning desert sun. We managed to drag ourselves out of bed at a reasonable hour despite a very disrupted night of border crossings and the rebuilding of our train. For reasons known only to the Chinese and the Mongolians, there is no common gauge railway line between Beijing and Ulaanbaatar. Every train crossing the border has to be shunted into an enormous shed where the bogies are changed. The process commenced just after 9:30 pm last night when the toilets were all locked and an hour or so of shunting jerked us hither and non. Chinese exit processes were managed during this time, so whatever slim chance of sleep there may have been was interrupted by banging on the doors and the gathering and returning of passports and immigration documents. About 1:30am we set off again, with the now-accustomed roll of the train sending us off to sleep. This was to be short-lived, as the door-knocking and shunting started up again as we crossed the Mongolian border. By 2:30am, peace was finally restored and we were able to grab a couple of hours' sleep.
Our carriage attendants are Mongolian women who seem to have been selected based on their inability to smile or relate to passengers in any civil way at all. It's a real shame, because the train's physical facilities are excellent, so excellent in fact that the carriage attendants have comandeered what was to be our compartment, shuffling us and other passengers one cabin down, domino-style. The down-side, for us, is that we share a toilet with, it seems, every carriage attendant on the train, most of whom don't bother to unlock our side of the door when they're done!
The Gobi looks very much like far western Queensland with slightly undulating, treeless plains with next to no vegetation coverage. Small nomad settlements, comprising a few gers in a rough compound, are flanked by small to very large flocks and herds of sheep, cattle, horses and/or goats in the distance. More permanent villages of poorly-constructed brick or timber houses cling close to the railway line. Most seem to be fairly much deserted.
We have passed a couple of large coal mines that seem to be relatively new enterprises, but there isn't much more out on the Gobi.


Arrival in Ulaanbaatar and hitching up with our local guide wasn't a problem at all. But there were some early tensions with young "Tom" (name changed to protect the not-so innocent). First off, he tried to hit us up for the taxi fare to our hotel. Not on, as transfers were included. Then we were offered a tour including an English-speaking guide, not Tom, for $300 US! Only problem - this was the day he was booked and paid for, to be our Ambaasador to Ulaanbaatar. By all means call us suspicious or even cautious, but please, not stupid!
For the night activities we hooked up with a couple of sisters from Perth and Adelaide and set off for the famous Mongolian throat singing and cultural concert. Next time you are in Ulaanbaatar, don't miss it. Seriously!


Mongolia is undergoing the same sort of rapid development that is occurring in China, but on a much smaller scale. The population of the country is just over 3 million, with half living in the capital. UB, as expats call it, will probably be ok once they put it back together, but at the moment it is like a bomb site.
More than sated by a nice meal at our hotel, we enjoyed our first good sleep in a couple of days.
22 September, Ger Camp, Mongolia
Roads in Mongolia are about average for developing countries and the driving skills of the locals are on a par with those we have experienced in South East Asia - that is, atrocious! Luckily, our driver for the 300 km journey to the ger camp was mostly cautious and attentive, except for one small lapse when he almost dozed off.
Our camp is one of hundreds that dot the open plains. Facilities are comfortable, but not luxurious, however the setting more than compensates for any shortfall in services. We initially thought our ger was specially fitted out for tourists, but when we visited a nomad family late in the afternoon, we were amazed at the authenticity of our accommodation. If anything, the real ger was slightly better fitted out, with a freezer and TV, both solar powered and a sink with running water.
We had assumed that the nomadic Mongolian herders were poor. Wrong yet again. All are well off by Mongolian standards and some very well off. The family we visited had a Landcruiser parked beside their ger. And why not? They pay no tax, land is free, education is free and the government pays to insure their herd!

Modern city life is rapidly changing the way of life of the nomads. Hundreds of thousands have migrated to the city, where they live in crowded slums on the city fringes. With very little education or skill, these immigrants are looming as a significant problem for the government.
23 September, Ger Camp, Mongolia
We retract our grading of the Mongolian roads as average. Today's trip of 100 kms to the Erdenezuu Monastery was a shocker! The best and fastest parts of the route were the dirt track detours that frustrated drivers had created around the worst of the pot-holed sections. Despite the rough roads, we had a great day and learned a lot about Mongolian history. The enormous plain on which the monastery stands was also the site of Kharkhorin, once the capital city of Genghis Khan. One million people lived here in what seems to have been a fairly cosmopolitan city of Chinese, Muslims and Mongolians. All went well until the 14th century when the Chinese twice burnt the city. Nothing remains today, but the stone from the ancient capital was used as the foundations for the monastery. As a result, Erdenezuu is of supreme significance to the people of Mongolia.


Just a few kilometers from our camp is an area of enormous, golden sand hills that lie on the very edge of the Gobi. Just for fun, and to work off yet another enormous lunch, we hiked about for a while, climbing a couple of dunes to get a fantastic view of the mountains. To top the day off, we also scaled the mountain behind our camp. From the base it looked to be a fairly easy climb, but we were soon puffing and huffing to the point where we almost gave it away, until we realised that we were at an elevation of more than 1600m. That was a bit of a relief, we thought for a while that we had lost all our hard-earned fitness. A far more leisurely pace paid off and, still puffing, we finally made it.

24 September, Ulaanbaatar
Drove four hours again today to return to the city, arriving in time for a quick spin through the National Museum of Mongolia which helped us pull together much of what we had seen and heard about Mongolian history and culture over the past few days. Our guide has been a little difficult to deal with throughout this trip. Some of the problem could be our strongly independent streak coming head to head with his inflexibility.
A quick shop for provisions and a good sleep readied us for our last day in Mongolia.
26 September, Mongolian-Russian Border
Crossing the borders between Mongolia and Russia is a long, drawn-out process which started sometime around 5:30 am and could take up to 12 hours. We had just made the train, even though we were at the station 4 hours before departure. We were dropped off very early, because our very expensive tour of the Genghis Khan statue and 13th century Mongolian Culture theme park, which we ended up doing with Tom, (but at a much reduced rate) was far shorter than expected. The statue was simply amazing. Bright, brushed, silver-plated Genghis, astride his horse, dominates the vast plains in much the same way as Liberty stands astride New York harbour.

The theme park was somewhat of a disappointment. Some of the six stations we visited were interesting, but we were very aware that many things were closed as it was close to the end of the tourist season, which is why we found ourselves at the station with 4 hours to kill. Nevertheless, we only just managed to get on the train in time because there were no departure boards or English announcements .
Our Russian Railways carriage was attached to the Mongolian train for the journey to the Russian border where we will join the Trans Siberian train for the remainder of our journey into Irkutsk. With two lots of Customs and Immigration, compartment searches and sniffer dogs and depending on the arrival of the Trans Siberian, we could be on the border for up to 12 hours. In the meantime, here we sit alone and isolated, one shiny silver carriage in a yard full of freight trains.
We have rejoined a group of, mainly, Australians who are on the more organised version of our trip. It is good to hear some "proper English" for a change.


Mongolia has been "interesting". We struggle for any other description. Rolling, light gold plains dotted with millions of sheep, goats, cattle and horses, thousands of nomadic ger settlements with shepherds herding their flocks and herds on foot, horse-back, on motor bike and in one case, in a Toyota Camry, will be our most lasting memories. Ulaanbaatar is much like any other developing country's capital, new high-rises and cranes everywhere, smog, unbelievable traffic and large areas of slums. All in all, Mongolia is an experience, probably only to be undertaken once.

Sunday, September 14, 2014

The Wait

Just a couple of days to go now. Bags packed, documents checked and house cleaned. This is a biggie, even for us! Starting in Xian, China, we are heading for Amsterdam overland.
We normally travel on a 'day to day' plan. Read 'no particular plan'. Because of the areas we will travel through, particularly, Russia, we have been forced to work through travel agents. All due respect to these agents, but we will never do it this way again! The costs are inflated by up to 300%.
Having gone through all the planning and visa application processes, we feel confident that we could have done it all ourselves after all. Oh well just another 'learning experience.
The first leg of our journey in China will take us from Xian to Beijing via the G-Train. The Chinese version of the Japanese Shinkansen bullet train. From Beijing we catch the Trans-Mongolian train across China to Ulaanbattar in Mongolia. After a couple of days in a Mongolian Ger we hit the rails again into Russia. Irkutsk, Moscow, St Petersburg and Helsinki follow, all by train. Then on to the Baltic States, Warsaw and Krakow in Poland, Hamburg and finally, yep still by train... to Amsterdam.