Trains and some more.... Week10

Week 10- China (Beijing, Trans Siberian Railway)

29^th of September to 8^th of October

Monday morning arrived, us packed and ready to negotiate the underground in Xi’an before breakfast. Aim: reaching the main train station with A LOT of time to spare!! Thanks to the lovely girlies in the Han Tang Youth Hostel, we were booked onto the 10:02am bullet train to Beijing.  After our first McD’s breakfast on this RTW trip, the kids were playing with their mini-bullet trains and collecting some fans and friends!!

We played a game of animal snap too and a little Chinese boy (about 1 year old) joined in the action.

I still find it a bit funny to see these small babies with out any nappies!! Their clothing is designed in such a fashion that there is a big opening between the legs, and I think they just “go” where ever and whenever. But what I’ve heard is, that these babies an also be potty trained before they are one year old. Different culture, different ways…

After our previous travel fiasco in SuZhou, we were so relieved to be seated on that train without any stress in the running up to it!! The bullet train between Xi’an and Beijing travelled at top speed of 303km/h. We covered a distance of 1200km in just under 5 hours. To put this into perspective, if there was a bullet train between Glasgow and London, it will take you just over 2 hours to travel there!! Again, this culture of extremes, displaying itself!! Hole-in-the-ground-toilets to bullet trains. It makes me smile!!

Everybody happy!!

We are getting very good and confident on these Chinese underground trains. With our big back packs and 4 children we can push a lot of people out of the way in the process of getting onto a train. Not even rush hour scare us!!!(I’ve seen a fantastic you-tube clip, about how people get squashed onto a rush hour train. Will try and find it for you!! Luckily our expeditions so far has not gone to that level yet…)

Squashed onto a subway....

I’ve booked us into an apartment hotel, west of the city center, near Embassy-of-the-World quarters. After our first week in China, we just used this time to catch up on admin, picking up our Trans-Siberian train tickets from the local agency I’ve used and to relax. We went in search of Ritan (Temple of the Sun) Park. A few bus journeys later and some help from locals with their goolge street map app, we enjoyed the lovely open space. Praise God, on our walk to the park, we also managed to find new walking shoes for the little girls…Merrells (at 150Yuan=£15 per pair…we were smiling!!) The previous two pairs of Carrimore children’s walking shoes needs mentioning. We bought them 6 years ago. They’ve served us as a family so well…Thomas had the ‘noses’ scuffed to the fabric, practicing his scooter skills down the hill in Kilmarnock, Arno has mended it a few times with STRONG glue…Philippa and then Nina has worn them over the years until they could not be mended anymore. We had so say good bye to them here in Beijing!! Hopefully their replacements will still be in good shape to be pass down to cousins over the next few years!!!

Besides Chinese New Year, we have (unbeknown to us) decided to travel on the buzziest day of the year… 1^st of October(Wednesday) was the fist day of the Chinese  Moon Festival, with the day also declared as the ‘National Day” in China. It was holiday for the whole country for the next 7 days. Luckily, after negotiate the Subway system again, we were leaving China on the 11:22am train across Siberia.

Boarding our sleeper to Mongolia

Our ticket was taking us as far as Ulaanbaatar (Ulan Bator) in Mongolia. We were all very excited, because this would have been our first overnighter on a train. The time of arrival in UB was, Thursday afternoon at 14:20. For financial reasons…we were booked into Second Class, hard sleeper. The locals and many tourists travel in this class. The soft sleepers just have 2 beds(berths) in each compartment, vs second class with 4 bunks. Nina did not pay and the other 3 were charged half price because they were under 140cm in height (hee hee…yes, that’s how they do it here in China!!) So there we were getting settled in our compartment on the 5^th carriage from the front, trying to find places for all our luggage. Arno’s bunk was in the next compartment and Nina and Philippa had to share a bed. We spend the rest of the day watching the Chinese country side go by, play Uno (even inviting a Chinese traveler-who shared the compartment with Arno, to join in…he brought the chocolates!!).

By dinner time we made our way down the train to the dining cart. A bit of confusion led to the discovery that we were issues with free lunch (obviously missed that!!) and dinner tickets at the time our carriage attendant handed the linen out. Luckily I had the tickets still in my pocket and we were loving the chicken and rice dish. (Arno and I were a bit desperate at this stage, because we found it very difficult to motivate the children and particularly Thomas, to eat anything Chinese!!!!) (And NO, China does not do Sweet-and-sour Chicken or fried rice…can you believe that??!!)

It was a bit of a palava settling everybody down for the night (the toilets were getting a bit smelly too…I was feeling for the people who were planning to be on the train for the full 6-day journey..) We arrived at the Chinese boarder round 10pm, where a peloton of soldiers guarded the carriages, while the passport officer got onto the train and collected our leaving cards and passports. While we were waiting for the admin to be done, our train was puffed (yes diesel engines) into the mechanic yard. At this stage all the carriages were separated and pushed into an individual dock (and yes, we were still inside the train!!). Now the mechanics set to work: we were manually pushed into the specific place, carriage-lift placed into position and then we were hoisted into the air. Yes, I kid not, the whole carriage with everybody inside was airborne!!

The reason for this is the following: the width of the train tracks between China and Mongolia is different. At this stage I had enough and it was after midnight, so I decided to go for a nap. Arno thought he is not gona bother, because the officials still had to return our passports on the China side, then we had to puff-puff over to Mongolia and go thought the whole process there again (minus the engineering…) Although I had to be woken up at the Mongolian side ( to present my sleep face to the boarder patrol officer) my decisions to take forty winks paid off…it was after 3am before we were finally on our way again! Poor Arno was a bit tired the following day!

We were welcomed by the Mongolian sun. After the polluted cloudiness we’ve experienced in China up to this stage, we were rejoicing! The rest of the morning was spend reading, while the kids were playing games with the compartment filled with Chinese girls. These children are people magnets wherever they go!!!

At lunch time we were heading towards the dining cart again…just this time, the Chinese one was left behind at the boarder and replaced with a beautifully decorated Mongolian ‘restaurant’. The Chinese girls warned us about the food, so we were pleasantly surprised to order from an English menu and find tasty-tasty food!!! Excitement was growing. Our introduction to the Mongolian culture was a very nice surprise. Even the waitress greeted us with: “Welcome to Mongolia!” when she found out that our final stop will be Ulaanbaatar.(‘Ulan Bator’ is the Russian spelling, and not too pleasantly received by the Mongols. More about that history in my next blog.)

As we approached UB form the east , the vast see-untill-your-eyes-can-not-see-any-further landscape changed into undulating tree-clad hills. Fall seemed to have taken over from the green summer lushness – warm shades of brown, light green and yellows were the tell tale. We were hanging out of the carriage windows drinking it all in.

WE WERE IN MONGOLIA!!!!!!! The final stretch into UB city centera surprised me with the colorful array of buildings, mix-match of houses, ger’s (that’s a traditional nomadic round tent – and do not forget the brand new Land Cruiser parked beside it) tall sky-scrapers, building work EVERYWHERE and loadsa junk clogging up open spaces. A feast for the eye. So much to see, so much to take in…

We arrived on schedule 2:20pm at the station and was welcomed at the door of our carriage no 5 by our driver, sent by the Golden Gobi Hostel. Now that’s giving hospitality a new meaning in my books!!! And so it continued…

Post script: Nina’s special word: ‘Youth Hospital’