We're leaving Russia, so its back to the train, and we seem to be the only people in the world making this journey today. Our delightfully decorated train carriage gets picked up and shunted along by various different engines during our two night trip over the Russia-Mongolia border, and having done our bit to destroy relations with Russia on our final night in Baikkal, it's a pretty quiet start to the journey. The highlight comes as we reach the border town on the Russian side, which is about as bleak as you can imagine - there appears to be more horses wandering round than there are people, but even these look a little suicidal. We're given four hours to explore this little town whilst our train carriage waits to be picked up, and its fair to say that's a little more than you'd need. There is a terrifying toy shop, a market with 3 stalls selling screwdrivers, elbow patches and whatever else they've come across, a 'supermarket' selling the essentials (fish jerky, vodka), and the local hotspot where a few of us end up…..a café/restaurant/nightclub/chink of light which looks like a birthday party gone wrong, but does sell the alcohol that humans (and possibly horses) would need in order to cope with life in this place. It's a special time for all involved - the staff put on their homemade light show and an eclectic music compilation for us as we struggle, but eventually manage to order some beer and chips to kill the time and make the best of our visit. Travel tip - don't drink too much beer when you're at long border crossings where you aren't allowed in the toilets.

And so to Mongolia! We're met from our train by the amazing Odka, an Ulanbataar native who'll be sorting everything out for us over the next few days. Dennis was lovely, in a way, but Odka is a step up……sort of like a tornado of smiles and sunglasses. The next 24 hours are spent being whisked around the city eating huge amounts of lovely food, buying whatever anyone wants to buy, and then ending it all by drinking too much cognac in the hotel bar.

Honestly, I wasn't quite sure what expect from Mongolia, having steered clear of any guide books for this trip, but its surprised me a little with how together everything is. I guess I thought it'd be a bit more crazy and dangerous, but so far literally everyone has been smiling (proper nice genuine smiles too), the city seems to work and it all seems pretty safe and nice. Here's some Mongolia nuggets I found interesting;

65% of people here are under 35 years old, and literacy is 97%.

Ulanbaatar is the coldest capital city in the world, and this is something like the 10th place it has been located.

Outer Mongolia just describes the country of Mongolia. Inner Mongolia is a province of China (they want to be part of Mongolia again,but the Mongolians don't want them back.)

Ghengis Khan (actual name Chinngis) had an empire stretching as far south as Vietnam, and as far East as Hungary. Ghengis is a pretty big deal here.

Ghengis really liked sex, and some people estimate that around 1% of the world's population descend from him. They say if the baby is born with a blue bruise on its back then its probably a bit Ghengis.

We're off to the countryside now…..