g'day possum

everything we had read or heard about the trans siberian trains referred to the alcoholic haze that most of the journey is spent in, due to boredom, interacting with the other passengers and copious amounts of vodka. this was not the case with us! :) we weren't bored, we drank mostly tea and coffee and there weren't many passengers!

at first i thought the lack of socialising may be because we were travelling first class and therefore in a two berth compartment. the opportunity for making lifetime friends is more likely in a crammed four berth (or enemies i suspect!) but all the compartments seemed to be full of mongolian traders on the eastwards journey and chinese migrant workers on the westwards. on the trans mongolian we did get to chat with two norwegian chaps next door who were travelling the same route as us to beijing before flying home and andreas from switzerland and layla from the uk who were doing likewise to beijing but then were heading up into a chinese valley near tibet where they were going to help a friend finish his guesthouse. we ate choc ices together on our anniversary on a station platform somewhere in siberia!

at irkutsk we had an influx of tourist groups moving from lake baikal to ulun bator for a ger camp experience. we met up with most of them again on the ulun bator to beijing train as it only runs once a week. in this group we chatted to peter and natalie, an australian couple taking the long way home from munich. natalie was full of useful advice for exploring berlin and convinced me i really needed a washing line! :) on all the internal chinese trains we were the only europeans which caused lots of stares but smiles too.

in the hotels we were often the only couple not part of a tour group which meant we got adept at trying to time our breakfast for after the rush. on our return to beijing we shared the breakfast scrum at the rainbow, (good hotel, naff breakfast) with a crowd of aussies waiting for their connection to shanghai and then home. trevor and sandra, (sandy), chatted to us one morning. trevor was from leicester but had emigrated in 1962 at the age of five and sounded pure oz to our ears. he threatened to get in touch in 2009 when they hope to holiday next in france and i threatened to mention him on this blog.

so i have! over to you,trev! :)