Considering I'd opted for the hard seat for my 14-hour train to Xi'an, I was pretty well rested. Went and met one of the guys from the trans-Siberian who'd come to Xi'an ahead of me. We made our way to the Great Mosque, picking up some really good street food on the way. Great Mosque was interesting, though it'll be better in a year as they had building work going on and the guy calling for prayer was clearing his throat every 3rd word - not the guy for the job.....

It was seriously humid when we first got to Beijing, but the humidity was soon broken by a monsoon. We decided to go to an acrobatics show in the hope the rain would calm down. In the show they had all sorts going on - balancing stacks of glasses on a lady's nose, chucking trilbys about and packing 8 guys on motorbikes inside one of those meshed spheres. It was a pretty ropey performance but luckily nothing serious happened! Shortly after we had our first taste o...

A bumpy bit of off-roading led us to the ger camps. A part of me was a bit disappointed that the ger camp we'd arrived at had a restaurant next door, with western toilets and spacious warm showers. Suppose my dream of using a hole in the floor would have to wait til China... Shortly after arriving we went for a hike and climbed a few small mountains - the grip on my 2 year old Fred Perry plimsoles struggling! We followed this up with a dip in a river nearby. Litt...

After pulling into the capital, Ulaanbaatar, the honch took us to the hotel. We caught up on some sleep, had breakfast and headed to a monestary with a beast statue of a Buddha. They say not to take pics in temples/monasteries but one of the guys on the tour insists on getting a panoramic snap everywhere he goes. Luckily for him the CCTV in the monastery had a blind spot... We roamed about the square, seeing 'Mongolia's White House' and went to their history mu...

Arriving in Irkutsk at 8 am, we found our honcho who took us on an hour bus ride to Lake Baikal. When your driver's throwing on dark techno early on a Wednesday morning and his car freshener just reads 'sex first', you're in safe hands. After some crazy overtaking, we arrived at the chalet by the lake, got some borscht and went over to the lake museum. Although interesting, this is just a bit of a fact-dropping wikipedia situation until they show you the differen...