I've found some internet access

28/29 July 2017
Trip days 10/11
Days 3/4 Mongolia

Day 3 Monglia:

Today was the first real day of the tour.  I'm already not sure I'm going to like this whole schedule thing particularly in town.  Maybe it'll be different out in the wild but having to limit myself to a certain amount of time for a meal or whatever is kind of annoying.

Breakfast was at 7.30am and we were to meet in the lobby ready to go by 8.15am ... the breakfast buffet was running a bit late but we all got done in time.

First thing on the cards was another Buddhist temple.  Oldest one in Mongolia.  I wasn't really paying attention but I think it was the only one to survive an invasion so that the new rulers could say they were not stamping out the religious freedom of the Mongols.  <cue Simpsons reference> Default! Default! Default!

Just another temple with another giant Buddha inside.  Apparently it's one of the places in Ulaanbaator that married couples go to get photos and bless the marriage so we saw a couple of weddings and a few of the tour group chicks harassed the couples and took photos.  Whatever - they just looked like western brides.  Weren't even in traditional clothing.

Then we headed off to the Mongolian National Museum which I completed in about 45 minutes.  #winner #newrecord

It had some interesting stuff (the traditional costumes were good as you would expect) but there are only so many fossils or plates or coins or arrows you can look at in museums around the world.  I'm sure Maile would disagree.

So we had 3 hours to do the museum and lunch on our own before we were to meet up again and head to the Black Market.  It's basically a big flea market but it's got EVERYTHING (except illegal goods apparently ... I'm not sure I believe that).  It was OK but as someone who wasn't shopping for anything it was initially interesting then increasingly hot, dusty and boring.

After that a few of us chose to go to a "cultural appreciation show" which is an excuse to get a bunch of money from tourists for sub-par performance art.  The Mongolian throat-singing was interesting and there was a pair of contortionists whose act was interesting and sexy (mostly sexy).  The rest of it was just singing or dancing or playing instruments in costumes.  I'm not sure if it was actually historically accurate but the female singers were shrill and horrible.  It reminded me a bit of the "ballet" we saw in Luang Prabang in Laos ... similar traditional rubbish.

That was the end of the official stuff for the day but a couple of us went to some war memorial to watch the sunset over UB in our last night there.  It was a really nice view actually and well worth the trip.  We caught a "local taxi" to the memorial.  It's basically Uber but without the app or any requirement for a decent car.  You stand on the side of the road hitchhiking and someone will eventually pull over and give you a lift somewhere for some negotiated price based on time, distance and how much petrol costs.  We had to direct her with Google maps which was kind of annoying ... I much prefer Uber.

Our local guide on the tour is a singer in a local jazz band.  She had a gig on last night that a few people went to.  I had intended to go as well but the sunset thing took so long that we thought we had missed it so we went for dinner instead.  Apparently she was on an hour later than expected so I wouldn't have missed it but I'm not really disappointed though she was a reasonable singer by all accounts.

Back to the hotel to pack and wash before we head off in our little truck tomorrow.

Day 4 Mongolia:
I'm sick!  I've got SARS or something (I.e. Man flu).
Runny nose, sore throat, bad sinus, watery eyes ... made for an unpleasant day on the bus today and no doubt tomorrow.

Up early for breakfast and meeting in the lobby to head out into the wild blue yonder.

Meet Rashida ... Queen of the Gobbi (...).  She's our truck.

Stacking luggage, safety briefing and a last minute shopping stop at what I assume is Mongolia's version of Costco.  Think Bunnings for food (and Beer!).

The truck is pretty good.  It's pretty full with 22 of us and the tour leaders/guide but there seems to be enough room for now.

We've all been allocated cooking teams and jobs on the truck.  I'm in cooking team 2 and I think we have to do about 8 meals all up ... a mix of breakfasts, lunches and dinners.  It's going to sound sexist but there are 4 females in my team so I'm hoping they step up and do most of the cooking while I just have to chop and clean shit.

My truck job is something to do with the water in the jerry cans.  Me and a girl (Nell) have to make sure the Jerry cans are full of water after each stop I think.

We're headed for Ogii lake today to stay in a ger at some tourist ger setup.

The roads here are pretty bad and the truck seems to amplify all the bumps so we trucking along and getting thrown all around the place.  Apparently these are the good roads so I'm sure whiplash is coming.

 We stopped at some ruins about halfway to Ogii lake.  The ruins pre-date the Chingiss Khan era Mongolia so they are pretty old.  They are ruins obviously but there are still some standing walls and what I assume is a cairn of some sort.  The quality of the stonework is really good ... I'm sure it was a real fortress in its day.

Lunch at the ruins (salad sandwiches) then off we go to Ogii lake.

This lake is pretty awesome.  It's pretty big though it only reaches a maximum depth of 3 metres.

We're in a ger camp right on the water which is nice.  After everyone dumped their bags in their gers we all jumped in for a swim.  The water was beautiful!  Great way to wash my clothes for the day :D

A storm rolled in while we were swimming so it went from a nice calm lake to windy with waves and rain pretty quickly.  Everyone ran out and took cover though it was a pretty small storm by the looks of it.

The ger itself is really roomy.  It's got 3 beds (a queen and 2 singles) and I'm sharing with an Aussie named Bruce.  The wind is not getting in this thing at all.  With the burner going I can imagine how well the Mongolians would survive winter in these things.  I hope it starts to rain again later ... the sound of it against the ger was great and would be excellent to fall asleep to.

The camp is very civilised.  Very clean and well provisioned toilet block with western shitters and nice showers (though there is no water pressure).

Seems like a really nice place to stay.

Dinner was disappointingly western.  We had mushroom soup, fish & chips and SPC fruit cocktail for dessert.  Nothing Mongolian at all.  Though as one of the guys pointed out their target market is probably middle class Mongolians so it makes sense that hey would serve something non-Mongolian if that's the case.

One of the gers turned into a party ger tonight.  Some drinking, some music.  Was fun.  My beer was still in the back of the truck though :(

See you in 3 weeks!

I haven't had time to make all the updates I wanted to.  Been busy doing Mongolia things.

We're heading off this morning for 3 weeks of travel around Mongolia camping and whatnot in remote places.

Don't know how good internet will be so it might be a few weeks before I post again.

Farewell!

Day 1 Mongolia

27 July 2017

Trip day 9

Days 2 Mongolia

I slept fantastically!  I was in a nice simple room at the Khuvsgul Lake Hotel (https://au.hotels.com/ho603714720/khuvsgul-lake-hotel-ulaanbaatar-mongolia/?rffrid=sem.hcom.AS.google.003.00.04.s.kwrd%3Dt.197922301099.14912549799.183493599.1t4.aud-125833227443%3Adsa-87391128309.1010217..0.Cj0KCQjwwevLBRCGARIsAKnAJvdUbiLVP27hc2CqCs19GcGQIPGxHW3ufTSrFTdlPa9qJupbTGJWzO0aAiy2EALw_wcB.aw.ds&semid=14912549799.183493599.1t4.aud-125833227443%3Adsa-87391128309.1010217..0&gclid=Cj0KCQjwwevLBRCGARIsAKnAJvdUbiLVP27hc2CqCs19GcGQIPGxHW3ufTSrFTdlPa9qJupbTGJWzO0aAiy2EALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds) right near Sukhbaatar Square.  Did a bunch of laundry in the sink and used my portable clothesline for the first time!

First thing I did when I woke up was book some accommodation for South Korea after Mongolia.  I also made sure to write down and send myself some directions to the hotel.

One of the German girls from the train told me about this cool offline maps app for my phone ... maps.me.  Very good!  Can download maps offline and use GPS to navigate without being connected to the inter webs.

One of the amazing things I did in China was to lock one of my new travel cards by entering the incorrect pin too many times.  Whoops!  So after my Korean booking exercise I headed down to the post office and sorted out an international call to the bank to get that shit unlocked.  I like this card ... does not have a cash advance fee so it's my best card for getting money out of ATMs.

I also organised some mobile data for Mongolia (although I don't expect to get any reception in the boonies) so I was able to play Ingress for the first time since I left!  Ulanbaator is a dead town when it comes to Ingress so I was able to take most of it without any opposition.  I am amazing.

So ... Ulanbaator.  Interesting city.  It's about 1million people and there is definite Russian influence in a lot of the architecture here.  A lot of the town is really run-down (footpaths in disrepair, buildings falling apart or badly in need of a paint job) but there is heaps of construction of new high rise buildings underway.  They are definitely in a transition phase as they begin to westernise with all the resources money coming to them.

This place certainly does not have the hustle and bustle of Beijing ... in fact I'm not sure I've seen a particularly busy street yet.  It's nice but it does seem really quiet.

Very easy to get around though.  Really flat, fantastic weather at this time of year (like Adelaide ... warm but not humid) and generally laid out in a pattern that makes sense.

So after doing my business in the morning and packing again I headed to the hotel I'm staying in for a couple of nights as part of the tour.  The Zaluuchuud Hotel (https://www.booking.com/hotel/mn/zaluuchuud-ulaanbaatar-mongolia.en-gb.html?aid=356987;label=gog235jc-hotel-XX-mn-zaluuchuudNulaanbaatarNmongolia-unspec-mn-tab-L%3Aen-O%3AosSx-B%3Asafari-N%3AXX-S%3Abo-U%3AXX-H%3As;sid=ec9999529ec69fd3bd8303903b80fb4f;dist=0&sb_price_type=total&type=total&) is OK but I definitely prefer the one I stayed in last night.  I'm on the 4th floor and there are no elevators :(. Have a big room though ... 2 bedroom place I'm sharing with another guy from the tour.

Apparently they only have 1 guest key for the rooms here and the previous occupants did not return the key early enough so we couldn't get into the room for a while.  Whatever - dumped my pack at the hotel and went for a big walk around the city revelling in my Ingress playing time.

Basically just walked the city having a look around.  Went to a Buddhist temple I stumbled across, ate some food, captured most of the portals in town.  Was a nice chilled out day.

Got back to the hotel in time for our Tour Group Meeting.  There are 22 people on this tour ... I feel like this is tooooooo many.  The bus is going to be absolutely packed.  Ah well. Everyone seems OK so far.  A mix of Australians, Americans, British and Germans with a wide age range and about a 75/25 split female to male.

After the standard briefing and round-the-room (I'm doing better than I thought at remembering 22 people's names) we went out for a group dinner at a "Mongolian BBQ" restaurant.  It's still called "Mongolian BBQ" in Mongolia surprisingly.  There are a lot of Korean BBQ restaurants here as well so it's probably worth being specific.

Not a big night but it was fun.

Chugga chugga choo choo!

25/26 July 2017

Trip day 7/8

Day 6 Beijing and Day 1 Mongolia

It's train time.  I leave Beijing today for Mongolia.  Woo!

Packed my bag this morning for the train ride.  Everything still fits (yay!) but fits slightly differently as I have some dirty clothes.  My packing cells don't quite line up as well as they did when I left but it's good enough.

A last walk around the area to pick up some food for the train ride and then off I go.

Wasn't particularly clear what I had to do to actually gain entry to the train station.  I was rescued by a nice local who pointed me to the giant line of security guards checking IDs.  I had assumed this was the ticket office and I didn't need to go there because I already had a ticket.

One thing I learnt today: Australians like going to Mongolia.
I sat next to an Australian guy in the waiting room.
A group of maybe 50 Australian scouts came through going to some jamboree in Mongolia.
Some more Australians sat behind me.

Many other westerners on this train as well.  I originally sat in the wrong berth (learn to read a train ticket dickhead!) with a couple of English people who were escorting some high school kids through China and Mongolia as part of some sort of a leadership and development program.  Interesting stuff.  The company pitches a trip to schools and then the kids have to raise all the money for it themselves and run the whole thing.  Budget, accommodation, events, food etc...  The adults are really only there to step in if things go terribly wrong.  I'm sure I would have been too scared to do that in high school but the world is a smaller place now.

Here's the train platform:

The train is really good!  It's much nicer than I expected.  I thought I had ordered a third class ticket (essentially open bunks in a carriage) but this train doesn't have those.  So I'm in a nice second class carriage with 3 girls - 2 Germans and a Frenchwoman who lives in Canada.  Nice people who have done a shitload of travel.  Here is a shoutout for a couple of blogs they run:
 - http://www.embracingthetravelbug.com
 - http://www.purelife15.wordpress.com

The cabin is really comfortable and the bench is long enough for me to stretch out!   The train is air conditioned and the food in the restaurant car looks pretty good.  I'm very impressed so far.

The window of the cabin is like watching a nature documentary.  The scenery at the beginning of the trip was really beautiful ... big mountains and rivers.  We then moved into a changing landscape of farmland, industrial stuff, more mountains and whatnot.  Some lovely views (fields of sunflowers for example), some interesting ones (like the Chinese penchant for building a cluster of half a dozen apartment blocks that look exactly the same in the middle of nowhere) to some boring/dirty ones (industrial type stuff).

Day 1 of the train ride was getting out of China.  It's such a huge country!  Granted this wasn't a bullet train but it still took us 10 hours to get from Beijing to the border.

The most interesting part of the journey was probably the track changeover between China and Mongolia.  They use different track sizes between the 2 countries which means all the carriages have to be changed over from one size to the other at the border crossing.

So we get to the border and the Chinese military come onboard and grab everyone's passports to do whatever they do with them.  The army guy was dressed impeccably in his dress uniform and was very polite.

After they take the passports the train gets moved to a different section of the railyard for the changeover to happen.  The changeover process takes about 3-4 hours.  During that 3-4 hours they cannot run the air conditioning or toilets in the train so you're essentially stuck in this hotbox in the middle of the night while they do the change.

The process is pretty simple but it takes a long time:
 1. Separate the carriages
 2. Line them up with the hydraulic lifts.
 3. Detach the wheel bit from the carriage bit.
 4. Lift the carriage with the lifts.
 5. Put the new wheel bit under the carriage.
 6. Drop the carriage onto the new wheel bit and re-attach it.
 7. Join the carriages up again.

Apparently the process of detaching and lifting the carriage is quite noisy and shaky for those inside the carriage.  I slept through the whole thing so I can't really comment on it :)

Fascinating process but I can't help but think there has to be a better way to achieve this than lifting up every carriage and changing the wheels over every time a train goes between China and Mongolia.

Eventually everyone tries to get some sleep then we get moved back to the train station and the Chinese army comes back onboard and wakes everyone up to individually hand passports back.

You feel quite vulnerable during this whole process.  Someone comes on board and takes your passport, locks you in the train carriage, then drives the carriage off somewhere.  It'd be easy to make a trainload of passengers disappear.  Thankfully there is probably too much paperwork in China for that to ever happen.

So then we leave China and cross over into Mongolia where they stop the train again and this time the Mongolian army comes on board and takes everyone's passports.  The Mongolian army woman was scary!  She came on in her camo gear with a very stern demeanour ... quite terrifying to wake up to in the middle of the night.

A couple of hours later (at least the aircon was going this time!) we get our passports
back and continue on our merry way.

This whole time the toilets were offline and I was busting for a piss.  There was some pacing happening.  Builds character I guess.

Woke up pretty early the next morning to see the Mongolian scenery passing by.  We were travelling through the edge of the Gobi desert at that point so it was sand and hills.  Stark but beautiful in its way.

One of the other things that happens during the changeover is they change the dining car from a Chinese car to a Mongolian car.  What a difference!  The Chinese car is a simple car with tables and chairs.  The Mongolian one has big carved wooden walls and chairs.  Very impressive!  Wish I'd gotten a photo.

The day rolled on.  We made a couple of brief stops at Mongolian stations to pick up or drop off passengers.

The scenery slowly changed from desert to plains to rolling grassland and hills.  It's a spectacular country with amazing scenery.  And you can see so far!  There is the odd hill or mountain but it's mostly just rolling grassland as far as the eye can see in as many shades of green as you can think of.  Great country if you love the outdoors and long road trips.

Eventually we arrived in Ulaanbator about an hour behind schedule.

There are a lot of private citizens who act as unofficial taxi drivers here but apparently  they can try to cheat you a lot.  So I decided to get the bus into the city since my hotel was very central.

However - dickhead that I am - I had looked up how to get the bus to the city from the airport not the train station.  One of the girls had a Lonely Planet guidebook that listed the bus I needed to get which was great - but that bus did not pass once in the half hour I was looking for it.  Eventually I tried to ask a few locals how to get into the city but they didn't speak any English obviously.  Eventually I hit on a magic word and a lovely old lady pushed me onto a bus that got me to the city in the end (despite the driver indicating it did not go in that direction - dick).

Checked into the hotel, went for a walk, had a couple of beers at the local microbrewery (they were OK - a Pilsner and a dark Pilsner were all they had on) then headed back to the hotel.

I love these countries.  This meal cost me about $4.

I bought a local beer at the supermarket across the road and thrived in the luxury of having access to the Google-net again.

The Great Wall and Peking Roast Duck

24 July 2017

Trip day 6

Day 5 in Beijing

Great Wall Day!

My original wall plan had been to go to Simatai.  It's one of the wild sections of the wall (not restored, original wall, run-down) but it's also a 3 hour trip each way.  Given the weather forecast was for a hot sunny day I didn't really fancy the idea of that long a trip and climbing rocks in that kind of heat.  I am a fundamentally lazy person after all.

So I booked a trip to Mutianyu.  Restored section of the wall but a bit over an hour out of the city so it doesn't get as many tourists as the really close section.  Also touted as being the most scenic.

Cop out!  Coward!  Lazy piece of shit!

I know I know.  And I'm disappointed with myself for doing it.  I'd been tossing up for weeks which section to go to and now that I knew how hot it was I decided I wanted a shorter trip and easier day.

The hostel helped me to book a private driver (I.e. I told them what I wanted and they did it).  It was 600 yuan (about $120AUD) for the driver for the day.  Pickup from the hostel at 7.30am and drop off whenever I was done ... but likely around 3-4pm.

And I had company.  A pommie guy living in Perth  joined the room at the hostel last night and he was looking to organise a wall thing for today.  So I invited him to join me and split the cost.  Worked out really well.

Away we went.  The drive was pleasant with some nice scenery once we got away from the highway ... Took about 1hr15min.  Arrive at the ticket office and there were not many people there which I took to be a good sign.

Shuttle bus up.
Cable car up - terrible signage. Apparently there are 2 cable cars.  A nicer one for people who bought a return cable car trip and a dodgier one for people who bought the cable car up / toboggan down ticket.  We obviously walked to the nicer one assuming that's what we had bought.  Anyway ... after a bit of faffing to identify the gate around we got on the cable car.

And the wall was beautiful.

The wall itself is really impressive (restored ... I know but still great) and the scenery is just fantastic.  Lush forest everywhere.  Mist covered mountains stretching out into the distance.

And the weather was great.  Slightly overcast, light breeze, not humid.  Great day for ...

CLIMBING GOD DAMN STAIRS.

So many stairs.

See ... I was expecting to walk a certain section from tower 14 to 20 (or whatever it was) which is supposed to be the most scenic.  I've got no need to walk the entire length of the wall to prove anything.

However - the cable car we got took us to tower 5.  Which means I needed to walk from tower 5 all the way to tower 20-whatever to get the best views.  GRR.  I am not fit.

The walk was a killer for me.  Up steps, down steps, up ramps and down ramps.  Sweat pouring off me.  The final climb in particular was really challenging.  Probably a few hundred steps uninterrupted.  My legs were ruined by then and I still had to get back to the start!

But I did it.  Regular stops and much promising to get more fit (yeah right).  Jimmy on the other hand (hostel guy) was happily walking along and climbing.  Bastard fit people.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.  It was definitely worth the effort.  Despite not doing the original section of wall I had intended I am not at all disappointed with the outcome.

The walk down was fairly painful for me as well but I got there.

There had been some light rain that morning so the toboggan wasn't running. It wasn't officially closed apparently but the people at the front had been waiting an hour for it to open so we just went down in the chairlift.

Our driver was waiting for us and we took a nice relaxing drive back into the city and peak hour traffic.

Had a nice shower then set about finding a Peking Duck place for dinner.  We went to DaDong Roast Duck restaurant which the Chinese guys in the hostel assured us was the best duck in the city.  Apparently it serves a leaner duck than the other top places which use a fattier more traditional style.

My map reading skills are not the best so after a false start we found the place.  Pretty fancy restaurant.  Huge.  Nice big tables and in the main section the chef comes and carves the duck at your table.

We had to wait 30 minutes for a table (on a Monday night!) then we got shoved into a little side room with the other sets of 2 people so we didn't get the full experience.

The duck was carved at the front of the room rather than at our table and the room didn't have the decorations or the ceremony of the main floor.

The menu at this place is a sight to behold.  It's about 2 feet tall, a food wide and about 1.5cm thick.  It's glossy with full sized pictures of every dish and a description of what it is in both Chinese and English.  It was actually difficult to handle it was so big and there was so much choice.  I did appreciate the presentation of it though.

We ordered the roast duck with condiments, a couple of vegetable sides, a couple of different types of dumplings and tried all the Chinese beers on the menu.  One of the Tsingtao beers (not the generic lager ...small batch of some kind) was so tasteless it was should have been called water.  The others (don't remember what they were) were OK.

The vegetables and dumplings came out first.   We expected it to all come out together at this place since it was all ordered together but apparently not.

Eventually the duck arrived and it was ... good.  I've never been a big fan of duck meat and this wasn't a revelation for me.  The meat was tender, juicy and the skin was crispy.  We wrapped it in the pancake with the cucumber, rockmelon, sauce (something like Hoi sin), lemongrass, garlic and sugar and ate it with our hands.  Other people were using chopsticks but this type of food demands hands!

Overall it was a good meal but the dumplings were better than the duck.

Finished up the night with some packing for the train to Mongolia tomorrow then out for a few drinks with a couple of guys from the hostel.

The Big Buddha and an Angry Bird

23 July 2017

Trip day 5

Day 4 in Beijing

I have booked my Great Wall trip!  The hostel was very helpful and found a driver for me instead of having to tie myself to a tour.  This means I can start and finish whenever I want to and I get to in a comfortable air conditioned car.

Did not do anything big today.  I went to the Wangfujing shopping district and had a wander around.  Went to the street with all the weird food.

Ate scorpion (just tasted like crunchy oil), bugs (same again) and some mystery meat on a stick (probably pork).  I was going to get a starfish to munch on on the way out but forgot!

After wandering around for a few hours (shopping malls are the same everywhere) I went back to the hostel for my midday aircon break.

Then I headed out in the afternoon and visited the Lama Temple ...biggest Buddhist temple in China apparently.  Lovely peaceful place with a very beautiful giant Buddha statue at the end.  I burned incense tried not to interrupt the prayers of actual Buddhists who came to worship.

Did not finish in time to look at the Confucian temple so instead wandered around the hutongs trying to find something interesting.  Didn't really.  My local ones were better.  #neighbourhoodpride

For dinner I went to this little place that was effectively a bunch of small street food vendors together in a fixed location.  You choose the things you want, get a receipt then go hand it to that person to make it for you.  I got a couple of things I didn't think I ordered but everything was awesome.

Something a little odd happened today.  I received a gift from one of the Chinese guys in the hostel.  Quiet guy, never said much because his English wasn't very good.  But apparently I was the first westerner he'd ever spoken to and he was quite appreciative that I'd been so friendly.  So he bought me a stuffed animal to say thank you.  He then took a couple of selfies with me and we had a brief conversation later via a translation app.  Nice guy but a weird thing.

The touristic things begin

21/22 July 2017
Trip days 2, 3 and 4.

After day 1 in Beijing I was not very happy with this city.  The heat and humidity were oppressive and it was just shit.  It made walking around and doing anything really hard work and I think I might have suffered a minor case of heat stroke or some dehydration.  I was just a cocky Australian thinking this wasn't real heat.  It didn't help that I lugged my pack an hour in said heat trying to find the hostel without Google maps.  In this scenario a wheeled case would have been superior to a backpack ;]

The area I'm staying in is nice.  It's one of those gentrified hutongs ... people still live in the smaller hutongs but the main one is filled with shops and food joints and a lot of teenagers/20somethings taking selfies while drinking some odd fruit or milk concoction.

The hostel itself was a pleasant surprise.  In pretty good condition, pretty clean and after the first night I got moved into a room with a bed long enough for my legs.  The aircon is very effective.  Peking International Youth Hostel - would recommend.  They've got these vines with nice orange flowers outside the front door.  Based on the number of Chinese people taking selfies with them it seems these are the only flowers in Beijing.


Beijing Day 2 arrived and with blessed relief the pervasive smog appears to have been hiding rain clouds!  It was still humid as the inside of a fat man's underwear but it was closer to 24 degrees than 34 degrees with a light wind which made a huge difference.  I mean ... I got rained on a lot of the morning so I was still soggy and uncomfortable but at least it wasn't 100% sweat!

I did the first of the big touristic (as is written on all the posters here) things yesterday morning .. Tianneman Square and the Forbidden City.

Both were giant bloody things and packed to the gills with locals and tourists alike.  Many many more Chinese than tourists though as far as I could tell.  It's like there's this comraderie when you find another tourist ... Nod, smile, maybe crack a stupid joke then move on.

Got there via the subway system which is EXCELLENT.  The ticket machine has an English version, the system is simple to figure out once you know what station to go to, it's clean, it's fast and trains come along extremely regularly.  It's like a nicer version of the London tube and it shits all over the Australian trains.  It's the quick and the dead for a seat though ... a person hasn't even finished getting up yet and someone is already sliding into their seat.

I don't quite know what to say about the 2 places other than to remark on their scale.  Both were interesting and the forbidden city was quite beautiful though it did become very same-same after a while (similar to any temple expedition).

I got propositioned by 2 prostitutes on the way out.  The first was far more attractive than the second.  There was also a very uncomfortable moment walking down the path outside the forbidden city with a couple of disfigured buskers.  Bad burns, disfigured faces and missing limbs ... just sitting there singing for coins in the middle of the walkway.  Not a very pleasant sight.  They did appear to take great pleasure in staring straight at people to make them uncomfortable though.

One thing I've noticed so far is a real lack of signage about where things are.  You get off the subway and there's a sign in the subway station saying "Forbidden City".  Cool.  You get out of the subway and it's very difficult to tell which way you're supposed to go.  Similarly on the way out.  I did not see any signs saying "subway this way".  Very odd for a tourist attraction.

So once I got out of the Forbidden City I just picked a direction and walked assuming I would see a subway sign. I did eventually ... I think I should have turned left instead of right at the start.  Ah well.

Got back to the hostel and had a shower then a couple of generic Chinese beers and tried to plan out my next couple of days without Google.  Amazing to see how much I rely on that when I don't have access to it.  Yahoo search works but I haven't found a decent mapping tool.  Google maps kind of works ... Gives an approximation of where something is.  It's good enough and that's part of the adventure right?

I met the other English speaker in my dorm today.  Lars is a German dude who has been living in regional China for a year studying the language.  He's stuck here in Beijing apparently until a friend comes to visit then he's going back to Germany for a while.  Seems a nice enough dude.  The others in the dorm are very quiet.  Many of them seem to spend a lot of time here laying in bed staring at their phones.  I get hiding from the humidity.

After reading for a while (I'm almost halfway through Crime & Punishment) I went back out for a wander around.  I found a nice park with some ladies doing some sort of exercise routine to terrible music.  A traditional dance I assume.  Then I found another park and another dance party.  A little square with a car blaring out really bad music and about 30 couples dancing.  A lot of them seemed to be doing the same dance so I wonder again if it was a traditional thing.


Day 3 Beijing
I slept really well on my new regular length bed!  I feel for the other occupants of the room ... suspect there was much snoring going on.  Their problem not mine.   First person asleep wins.

So Lars told me that I could visit the Summer Palace via the subway system which seemed like a great idea to me.  I was originally planning to do it on the same day I do the wall (which I still haven't organised) but I decided to do it today on its own instead.  Boy am I glad I did.

Getting there was easy ... I turned the right direction (left) out of the subway this time (hooray dumb luck!).  And again this place was huge!

It's a beautiful forested mountain with a lake at the foot of it and a small island in the middle of the lake.  The palace itself is at the top of the mountain (fuck you stairs) and gives a nice smoggy view of the surrounding area.  I enjoyed this much more than TS / FC.  Architecture was similar if not on as grand a scale.  But it was just lovely.  Beautiful scenery, lovely forest, well maintained.  There were a couple of the smaller structures which were quite captivating.

I ended up spending about 5 hours wandering around climbing up stairs, down stairs, up paths and down paths.  Again ...many many more Chinese tourists than westerners.

I'm spending a small fortune on bottled water when I go to these places.  Nowhere in Beijing that I've been has refill stations for water so you've got to buy bottled water as you go.  Costs about the same as Australia (6 yuan ... About $1.20) so it's not expensive but I shudder to think how much plastic goes to waste here.  I bought this fancy bloody water bottle with a filter and I'm only using the thing a couple of times a day.  Ah well.

I haven't been hungry since I arrived so really haven't partaken of the food much.  I've really only had a couple of snack type things.  A bao bun, some Chinese variation of takoyaki (the batter was sweet), a roast duck wrap and a giant xiolongbao dumpling.

The dumpling was cool.  It's about the size of my fist and it comes on a little box.  You stick a straw in the top of it and suck the juice out then eat the dumpling skin and filling afterwards.  I put the straw in the wrong spot (... that's what she said anyone?) and juice started leaking out so I had to quickly drink it and burn my god damn mouth.  Anyway ... Interesting way to eat a dumpling and it was tasty.

Found a craft beer place about 10 minutes walk from the hostel on my afternoon wander!  Score!  Great Leap Brewing ... owned by an American guy who lives in China.  All the brewing is done in Beijing and they have 3 locations.  Their schtick is using Chinese tea leaves in their beers.  The beer was OK ... nothing amazing.  They had a banana wheat beer which was OK (but a bit watery) and the Honey Ma Golden & Honey Ma IPA were tasty (honey and peppercorns I believe).  I think the venue was the best part about it.  Hidden away in the hutongs with a nice outdoor area under some trees and a nice bar inside you can sit at.  Place was about half / half expats and locals.

Then later I went for some drinks with a couple of guys from the hostel.  They said they had found a cool bar nearby.  So I sat at that same craft beer joint twice in one day ... woe is me!

I made it to China!

19/20 July 2017
Trip days 1 (travel) and 2 (Beijing day 1)

So I made it to Beijing!

The Brisbane to Hong Kong leg went without a hitch.  One of my best flights ever ... Maybe 1/3 of the plane was full so I basically had the last 5 rows to myself.

The Hong Kong to Beijing leg was another story.  Arrived without drama, got my boarding pass, caught the train to the other terminal's departure lounge ... simples!

And then the delays started.  Now this was scheduled to be an 8.20pm flight.  The flight was originally delayed for about an hour without any sort of notification (at least not that I could understand).  Then it took another half hour after the new departure time for us to start boarding.  The plane itself was fine (an older plane with a 2-4-2 configuration in cattle class) although it had these weird little footrests (obviously for the shorter Asian market) for little old ladies to mount their feet on.  Of caourse what this meant for me was that I lost a couple of inches of leg room and only one of my legs could move out of a 90 degree angle.

Once we were finally boarded we sat on the tarmac at the gate for about 30 minutes without any word.  Then we got an announcement saying we were lucky ... it would only be another hour before we pushed back!  So we're sitting on the Tarmac for 90 minutes and the crew has started to serve dinner since it's now between 10.30 and 11pm.  We finally start to push back and then stop.  Get a little further then stop.  Then we get out and are stopped on the runway for a bit.  Annoying!  If we're not going to leave for an hour at least leave us in the terminal!

Eventually we got flying only to have to change terminal in Beijing so we drove around for about 20 min.  We got off the plane about 3am then had to do the whole customs thing and whatnot.

So I got out of the airport and it was 30 degrees and 90% humidity at 4am!  I was not at the terminal I was expecting and I didn't have my hotel name in Mandarin (my mistake!).  Given some of the reviews I wasn't confident the hotel was going to be open at 4am for me to check in.

I'll admit it ... I had a little moment.  I couldn't understand the broken English of half the people trying to talk to me and I was getting very frustrated.  I ended up getting the free shuttle bus to the terminal I was expecting then had a nice sweaty walk in jeans to the airport Hilton and paid more than I wanted to for a very fancy hotel room with an awesome shower and very comfortable bed.  It was proper fancy.  A multi-level, multi-bedroom, multi-bathroom suite.  I got the room at half price because I checked in so late and it was still far more than I would normally pay.  Whatever.

I was in a much better state of mind in morning.  Didn't sleep well ... something I often find when sleeping somewhere new despite being really tired.  One advantage of the Hilton is they have all the things.  I raided their toiletries and took what I wanted, took some toilet paper (because China!) and just luxuriated a bit after a shitty travel day.

So I got the train into the city today and walked down to my new accommodation.  Much further away than I thought ... google maps isn't great here.  Very sweaty.  33 degrees and 70% humidity but feels like 44 degrees according to my weather app.  That seems an accurate assessment.  It's really gross outside.

The hostel seems fine though it is a stark change to the Hilton.  I'm currently sitting in the common room using their internets and drinking some generic Chinese beer for about $3.50 a bottle.  Have seen some German or Austrian dudes, a couple of American chicks and a bunch of what I assume are Chinese staying here.

At the moment I don't have a sim-card so I'm relying on wifi at the hostel.  I'm not convinced I will actually pick up a SIM since I'm not running a VPN.  It's interesting to see how much I rely on Facebook and various Google services to do anything.

And away we go!

Bag made it through for carry on without any issues.

In a truly Australian way I had smashed avocado for breakfast at the airport.

They have just called boarding.

I'm away!

Bag-tetris!

Packing day!  I fly out tomorrow so I've been doing a couple of practice packs trying to win at bag-tetris.

My stuff laid out on the bed.

My packing list (including the things I'm going to wear to the airport) is:

1. Clothes:
1. 7 shirts (6 short sleeved and 1 long sleeved)
2. 4 pants (1 jeans, 1 long travel pant, 2 shorts - suspect the shorts may be ditched when I get to Denmark)
3. 8 pairs of underwear
4. 5 pairs of socks
5. 1 pair of thongs / flip-flops
6. 1 pair of boots
7. 1 jacket
2. Toiletries:
1. 1 toothbrush
2. 1 toothpaste
3. 1 roll-on deodorant
4. 4 bandaids
5. 1 hand sanitiser
6. 1 container of liquid soap
7. Earplugs
8. Travel soap leaves
9. Anti-poop pills
3. Tech
1. 1 iPad with detachable keyboard
2. 1 Mobile phone
3. 2 Battery packs
4. 1 multiport USB charger with universal adaptors
5. 4 charging cables (3 micro USB and 1 iPad cable)
6. 1 OTG cable
7. 1 set of headphones
8. 1 USB stick
4. Miscellaneous
1. 1 Sleeping bag (large grey sack)
2. 1 Sleeping bag liner (medium red sack)
3. 1 Daybag (small yellow sack)
4. 1 Small microfibre towel
5. 1 Eyemask
6. Portable Clothesline
7. 1 book
8. 4 packing cells
9. 1 document wallet with passport etc...
10. 1 waterbottle
11. 1 wallet with cash and cards
12. 2 carabiners hooked to the side of the bag
13. Glasses
14. Sunglasses

I think that's it.

So after stuffing my packing cells it looks like this:

I still don't think I've got the optimal setup but it all fits in the bag!

My problem now is the weight of the bag.  Last measure was about 11.5kg which is well over the 7kg for carryon.  We'll see how it goes.

For context here is the size of the pack with me wearing it.

I think I'm going to have another go later.  I want to have it all laid out in such a way that I can easily pull out what I need for the flight if they make me check the bag.