We've been to Kunming twice now, once on the way to Lijiang and once on the way back as we couldn't get an easy route from Lijiang to Xian. When we'd originally planned to stop here we were encouraged by all the advertising which described Kunming as "The City Of Eternal Spring". Thoughts of pleasant springtime days abounded in our imagination, and we headed to the City with enthusiasm. The first time we were here we got soaked everyday.....and abandoned a plan...

We didn't get much chance to venture past the immediate environs of the hotel during our stay in Kunming due to the heavy rain which came in torrents leaving huge puddles and wet natives. We did however manage to make it to the ticket office to book two of our upcoming sleeper train journeys. In China, there are numerous options when choosing seat types. On overnight trains, the favourite option is often soft sleeper, four beds per lockable cabin in bunk style...

Hooray, we've survived the Chinese sleeper train, and are here in Kunming. We left Guangzhou on our first Chinese sleeper train, the 16 hour Z211 at 19:42. We'd arrived at the station in good time to face our first challenge - making sense of the Chinese way of doing things. There were a number of queues heading into the station, all numbered. We looked on the large display and noticed our train had a number four on the same line (thankfully the Chinese also us...