Trans-Siberian : Ulaan Batar to Beijing

We somehow managed to not find our tour guide on the morning we were supposed to leave UB, so we headed to the train station on our own. Luckily, there was a driver to take us so it wasn’t a problem at all. We jumped on the train, ignored which beds our tickets said we were supposed to sleep in and arranged ourselves in the same groups we had been in on previous train trips (4 people to a berth).

We settled in and the prodvonistas seemed 100% nicer than then Russian ones we had had. They even brought us hot water in real mugs and tea! (Note that they then tried to charge us for this hot water just before we got off the train. Meanwhile, we could have gone up to the water tank and gotten it for free ourselves!). One of the women came to collect our tickets and was very angry that we had all changed beds. Oops J

The train ride itself wasn’t long but it was quite spectacular. We went through the Gobi desert which was…sandy. It was pretty and the sunsets was beautiful. We even saw some camels sleeping and generally hanging out near the train tracks. That was cool. As we came into China we got to see the Great Wall from quite close. That was really exciting. At one point we had a quick stop so that w ecould all get out of the train and take our first of many ‘Great Wall’ shots. It is really amazing to be so close to history. We’ve written an update about our trip to the Great Wall from Beijing.

As we arrived in Beijing, we tried to get our train tickets back from the train lady but she refused unless we paid for the hot water she had delivered to us! Needless to say, most of us didn’t get our tickets back. Beijing was bustling, but not nearly as crazy as we thought it would be. We got to our hotel and you can read the rest in our Beijing update...

m.