Kota Kinabalu & Seafood

To pick up where we left off - we landed in Kota Kinabalu (KK), Malaysia on the island of Borneo and we desperately needed summer clothes to fit the new tropical climate.  Sweaters and long sleeve shirts don't have much place when its HOT and HUMID.

Luckily there was a mall right across the street where we spent more time than needed trying to find the cheapest clothes that, err, actually fit!  We quickly found that the Malays are bit more petite than the average American - especially the ladies!  Josh had an easier time, whereas I was trying the largest size they carried and couldn't get them past my thighs!  This is an XL?  It looks like it would fit a 12 year old!  Uh oh.  But as luck would have it we found a "Factory Outlet Store" where they stocked Western brands we recognized.  Score!

So after several painstaking hours of shopping we headed down to the waterfront to grab some food and tour the market.  One of the other things we will take away from KK is the seafood.  It's everywhere for breakfast, lunch and dinner - in the rice, noodles and even the veggies are cooked with the little dried anchovies for flavor!  The variety is endless as well - huge squid and shrimp plus all types of fish.  As you'd expect at the markets there were numerous stalls selling the day's fresh catch.  Just walking through the stalls was fascinating, if not a little fishy dodging fish juice spilling off the stalls in flip flops!

The market had lots of stalls selling fresh fruit and veg along with rows of tables with a grill at the back and pre-cooked seafood at the front ready to be reheated and eaten.  It was fun to look at but the idea of pre-cooked seafood just didn't sit well with us...

Amongst all of the seafood we did find one non-fish dish that Josh loved.  Its a veggie dish made of pickled cucumber and carrot, mixed with fresh pineapple and fresh chili.  Pickled in this case means sort of a salad mixture that's had time to soak and mix the flavors.  It sounds as strange as it comes but it was basically sweet chili veggies!

In addition to some new clothes, Josh needed a hair cut and to shave off the beard - it wasn't fitting of the new tropical environment - haha!  He hated seeing the beard go - he had good fun being the token Westerner with a thick beard - but he felt refreshed afterwards.

We also hit up the Gaya Street Sunday market - like many other street markets we've seen they sell a little of everything and it was definitely interesting.  The thing we most coveted from the market was the coffee!  Our hostel was serving local coffee - it was so thick and rich - but unfortunately we had no way to brew it and they didn't really sell packages that were airtight enough to send home.  Oh well - it's left us with fond memories of a delicious cup of jo.   

Oh and for those wondering how long we could take the seafood noodles and rice dishes, we finally broke down and had a large Pizza Hut pizza.  Pepperoni!  I'm not gonna lie, it was good!

Sky on Fire

This is going to sound cliché but the sunsets have been nothing short of unreal since we arrived in Malaysia.  Case in point:

We headed down to the boardwalk of restaurants on the water for dinner one evening after a grueling day of shopping for a new summer wardrobe.  I setup the tripod and remote trigger to save some effort while we relaxed and sat on the edge of the boardwalk.  Snap - right as the sun tucked away beyond the horizon.  It was a nice sunset, as you can see.  We smiled, pleased for a good ending to the day with our feet dangling over the water...

Being patient, we stayed for the encore - the sun isn't always done when it falls below the horizon - while others around us set off to source some dinner.  We learned this lesson a few years ago in Istanbul where we grabbed one of our all time favorite photos.  Funny enough, in that instance we bailed after what we thought was only a semi-spectacular sunset (kind of like the above) but lucked out later.  I digress.  

Anyway, a few minutes later we started to get some color.  Ok...some big color.  Looking at my watch is was still getting brighter nearly 20 minutes after the sun ducked under the horizon then...

...wow!  Brighter and brighter - more and more color!  Every wispy cloud was absorbing and reflecting an Easter-egg shade of color.  After a reposition, I captured the final image nearly 25 minutes after sunset with the water and sky both glowing like they were on fire.  Can you see Steph?  That was our view for this awesome display.

So please take this lesson with you...let sunset go for an encore.  The real show may only have just begun.

We will be back with a little more on Kota Kinabalu and our latest hangout, Mantanani Island, later.  Our little island paradise only has internet after they turn on the electricity from 6pm to 6am...

Forbidden City

What can I say about the Forbidden City - the infamous home to 24 emperors over a couple hundred years?  Dating back as far as the 1400s, its a huge complex of palaces, gardens and the royalty extravagance you'd expect.  On top of the 980 buildings, you can see artwork, golden cups, carved jade stones that took hundreds of horses and men to move from one side of the country to the other, along with narrow passages leading to gardens while hearing stories of empresses and concubines.  It's hard to imagine a time where EVERY one inside the walls had to be specifically allowed in by the emperor!  Not to mention the eunuchs (normally also servants) who carried their man hood around in little jars on their waist so they could be trusted not to infiltrate the royal blood lines.

Forbidden to all, just take a look at the security measures.  A 26 foot high wall surrounded by a 170 foot wide moat!  No wonder this place has a name like The Forbidden City.  People just had no idea what was inside the big walled city.  Now a days luckily it opens to visitors and not used as anything official.

Inside you start recognizing some of the symbolism at play in each of the buildings.  The outer buildings are arranged in groups of 3 to represent heaven while the inner buildings are arranged in groups of 6 representing earth.

At each entrance there are usually 2 gilded lions, one male and one female, guarding the doors (See the picture at the bottom).  Under the male lion's right paw is a ball representing imperial power.  Under the female's right paw is a baby symbolizing fertility.  We couldn't get over the women's claws and the baby...these were exceptionally detailed.

All of the buildings' roofs are glazed yellow tile, the color of the emperor. They are decorated with a man riding a phoenix leading a string of demons followed by an imperial dragon.  You can tell a building's importance by the number of little demons following the phoenix.  The more the better!  The one on the left was one of the main buildings used by the emperor while the one on the right is a minor building.  Only The Hall of Supreme Harmony had 10 demons.  No other building in imperial times could have that many.

And the buildings all have surreal sounding names:  Gate of Supreme Harmony, Palace of Earthly Tranquility, Palace of Heavenly Purity, Hall of Mental Cultivation, Gate of Divine Might, Palace of Tranquil Longevity and on it goes.

One other note.  We had read that the English audio guide was narrated by Roger Moore.  If it used to be, its not any more.  However, we did run into a tech upgrade in the tourist industry - GPS enabled audio guides!  You walk around and it just talks to you since it knows where you are.  It even had an electronic map with LED lights that lit up as you walked around.  Cool!  You can see Steph holding it in the photo.

Verdict - there wasn't as much to see as we expected, but it is full of ancient mystic, grand symbolism and historic significance.

More Forbidden City Photos

Temple of Heaven and Heavenly Bathrooms

The Temple of Heaven is one of the main symbols for Beijing as a city.  Its plastered everywhere.  First built in the 1400s this iconic building has been a driver for a lot of far east architecture over the years.  It is a complete wooden building without nails.  Frankly, it is one cool building!

To make a long story short, the Emperor of China was recognized as the son of heaven.  Twice a year he would come to pray and give sacrifices, showing respect to the heavens, for good harvests.  There is a long and complex ceremony that the Emperor himself had to perform.  It was believed that any small mistake in the ceremony would be a bad sign for the entire country in the next year.

Set inside a big park in Beijing, you can also see lots of Beijingers getting the day's exercise amongst the old cypress trees.  From hacky sack to yoga, to flag twirling, along with other wild and wacky exercise techniques.  Our favorite was the flag twirling.  A group of laides would gather, turn on some music and go to town twirling the flags.  This particular lady was exceptionally good with a very long flag.  It was cool watching as she whipped the flag around to the music trying to not let the flag touch the ground.  She was also gracious enough to let Steph have a try and give her a quick lesson.  Flick and turn your wrist as you twirl the flag, she motioned.  Steph eventually got the hang of it and made some fun flag shapes.

After a few hours of touring we stumbled into some heavenly bathrooms (see our previous post about rated bathrooms).  A four star rated loo!  Heavenly...

We also had a quick bite to eat and we've now well and truly learned that "spicy chicken" in China is beyond our spice comfort level!  When they say spicy they mean spicy!

I also put together this panoramic showing two of the other buildings in the complex.  We sat and had morning coffee with this view!  This place is a must for any visits to Beijing.  It was fun to photograph.  Here are the rest of the photos.

To round out the day we taxied over to a not-to-be-missed antiques market.  The Panjiayuan market sells everything from cheap trinkets to grand and expensive antiques (although you need to have a good eye to tell the real from the fake)!  After wondering a few rows we went around the corner, found another busy area, then rounded a corner again to find a huge roofed area as big as a warehouse with row after row of stuff!  Steph could have done some serious damage here if shipping it home weren't an issue!  We did walk away with a pair of Chinese dog bookends though which should make it back to KY in about 3 months time thanks to "surface" shipping from Beijing!

A few last Beijing notes

A couple more Chinese signs that made me smile...

I have a few more posts I need to write on some of the Beijing sites so be on the lookout for those.

In other news, Blogger, YouTube and Twitter have magically started working again!  Woohoo!

Flying south for the winter

We flew the coup, south, to Malaysia!

You read right - we left China and are now in Malaysia, on the island of Borneo in a city called Kota Kinabalu.  Its 85 F (30 C) degrees with 70% humidity as I sit here in the hotel lobby typing this blog.  For now it's a MUCH welcome change from the 25 F (-3 C) degrees in Beijing.

So why the big change?  Well, we weren't planning on making this big of a jump but two themes kept replaying.  First, after getting to China and investigating the many sites and activities across the country,  most of them would just be better with nicer weather - hiking, biking, exploring parks and temples, boats down the Yangtze, etc.  So, with Steph's just-in-case planning in getting us a double-entry Chinese visa, we decided we would see Beijing now and then come back and enjoy the rest of the country in a couple months.  Second, we were just flat tired of the cold!

We found a shockingly cheap flight on JetStar to Singapore and then another cheap flight over to Borneo.  Done.  Now the new plan is to work our way back up South East Asia where the weather is warm.

With our cheap fights to Kota Kinabalu, we had an odd 2:50am departure from Beijing and a long transfer in Singapore.  However, we did get one small surprise.  Singapore Airport.  This is a dream airport for a layover.  It's geared to be peaceful and help you pass the time.  They have a tropical butterfly garden (photo above), free foot massages, free movie theatre, roof top swimming pool, koi fish pond, outdoor cactus garden, sunflower garden, little crafts stations, the works!  Plus to top it off they play serene tranquil music throughout the entire place.  Lounging around you feel like you are floating on cloud 9.  For all the stress in travel, this is a good place to relax.

Upon arrival in Kota Kinabalu at 9pm we had one big problem.  We didn't have ANY warm weather clothes.  Shorts - no, Sandals - no,  and it was 79 degrees...at night.

First things first, we put on the only t-shirts we had and headed to the outdoor clothes market to pick up some shorts (and a dress for Steph).  A little bad haggling later we both had a new, more suitable outfit, changed clothes and headed for dinner.

Across the street was a huge fish restaurant / market.  I really don't know how to describe this place.  It's a big outdoor structure with a mass of tables in the middle and fish restaurants surrounding it to make 3 sides of a square.  Out front of all the restaurants are lots of aquariums stocked full of seafood where you choose what you want to eat.  Talk about a new experience.  On top of the normal 10 people all trying to get you in their restaurant, you had to choose the live fish you wanted to eat!  The selection was huge but we had no idea which fish was what.  After finally choosing a place and sitting down to see the menu, we settled on a Black Pepper Beef dish with vegetable fried rice (because the seafood seemed strangely expensive and we weren't up for the challenge at 10pm).  It turned out to be a good decision not only because our dish was very tasty but the hostel owner told us afterwards that you could easily be ripped off buying seafood.

To eat seafood there you must always do the following: Choose your exact fish from the tank.  Literally point to it and watch them take it out of the tank.  The fish is priced per 100 grams so you have to watch them weight it and get an exact price for that fish.  From there the haggling kicks in.  You can negotiate a better price for the fish and all the extras you want with it - cooking style ( fried, boiled, steamed, bbq ), side dishes, dipping sauces, the works.  Once you agree a final price then you just have to hope they bring you the same fish on the plate.

Here is a short video clip of the Night Fish Market here in Kota Kinabalu to give you a better idea.

Sounds interesting for sure, but we think we'll now opt for the restaurant the hostel owner recommended to us - its much cheaper he said.

Now off to source a new tropical wardrobe...

Chinese Signs and Translations

We are loving some of the signs and translations.  There are all kinds of random instructions such as:

Wonder if this is the same issue as cell phone use being prohibited at gas stations....?  (this was at a temple, by the way)

We also found out yesterday that there is a bathroom star rating system!  Somebody google and see if there is an app or website that locates them all.  We hit a 3 star and 4 star bathroom yesterday and compared to some of the um, barely-tolerable-even-for-guys-bathrooms we've had to suffer through, these were clean and worth the star rating.  The stall doors in the men's were even complete with a number and picture of how to use the toilet.  Very helpful indeed.

You're not a man until you climb the Great Wall...

...well, I couldn't have that, so we booked an excursion out of Beijing to Mutianyu, to visit a section of the Great Wall.  This portion of the wall was originally built in the Northern Qi Dynasty (550 – 557) but a major portion was rebuilt by the Ming Dynasty (1368 – 1644).  You can explore a nearly 2.5 km stretch while traversing big inclines as you make your way from watch tower to watch tower with the wall winding its way across the top of the mountain. 

Although its set in rugged countryside, surrounded by mountains and forest, this place is by no means a secret due to its proximity to Beijing.  There is a cable car to take you up and down and for the more adventurous, there's an exciting toboggan ride down!  Yeah...of course, we took the toboggan!

We ended up with a fantastic winter day to explore the wall.  The sun was shining, the wind was calm and the skies were blue, which only added the awe of seeing the Great Wall.  However, you quickly realize this isn't a causal stroll in the park.  To cover a lot of ground it's daunting!  The wall sits high up on a ridge of the mountain, so of course it follows the natural terrain.  You start walking - scaling the inclines, staggering down the declines, climbing the uneven and at times gigantic steps, which only lead to more and more of them.  Up, down and around you go, following the path laid for you so many years ago.  It was surreal.  Thinking of the old school Chinese guards on patrol, standing watch and occupying the houses, along with coming to grips with how small a portion of the wall you were actually seeing.  Mind boggling!  Then as we found out in Mongolia, it didn't even work!  Ghengis Khan found a way around this great structure to take Beijing, its primary reason for being built.

Anyway, we climbed our fair share of the wall making it to gate 14 when we spied the seriously l-o-n-g uphill climb to gate 23 and decided the view was much better from below!

Other than hiking and enjoying the crisp beautiful day, we did make some new friends as you can see in the photos.  And there's photographic evidence that I did indeed climb the wall.  Whew - my manhood is safe!

Great Wall Flickr Photos

One sign we can read!

We just can't escape Colonel Sanders!  At least we can read the sign...

Not surprisingly they have tweaked the menu adding star shaped fried fish cakes along with a Peking Duck wrap complete with hoisin sauce!

Happy Chinese New Year From Beijing

It's officially the year of the Dragon - 2012!  The fireworks are still sounding in the city.

Chinese New Year or 春節, translates as "Spring Festival" which is the most important holiday of the year.  There are family feasts on New Years Eve, traditions of giving lucky money to kids, burning fake money, dragon and lion dancing and of course fireworks!  The festival ends 15 days later culminating with the Lantern Festival.

By fireworks, I don't necessarily mean  big organized shows.  Families set them off at their doorstep to drive off the evil spirits and start the new year with good fortune.  All throughout the day you could hear zips, bangs and other firework noises in all parts of the city.  At times you'd be walking down the street and here a big CRACK.  Turning around you see a kid holding his ears after just setting off a firecracker.  In the couple hours leading up to midnight on NYE it sounded as if the city was under siege - a constant rumble of explosions all around you!  

Along with the festivities, we have been sampling some of the local cuisine including dumplings and peking duck!

Dumplings are a New Years tradition and we found a fantastic little dumpling restaurant called Mr. Shi's Dumplings.  We ordered two plates of dumplings and two soups, but they quickly said, no, no to the second soup.  We understood why when they served us what seemed like a gallon of Hot and Sour soup!  For dumplings fillings we opted for mutton and carrot along with pork and fennel - both were delicious.  And Mr. Shi even took our photo.  A great find!

The other big ticket food item to have in Beijing is Peking Duck.  With the help of a guilde book tip we stumbled into Bianyifang's to try their version which they have been perfecting for 150 years!  Before we could order though, we had to have a look through their extensive menu of Duck foot with mustard, wine drunk duck heart, braised sea cucumber and pigs blood and oxtail soup, to name a few!  We settled on the standard Peking duck with pancakes, cucumber, spring onion and hoisin sauce.  To enhance the experience, a chef came out and carved the duck at your table.  We polished it off nicely!

In between New Year's festivities and eating we are making it around to the sights and look forward to visiting the Great Wall on Friday.  We got a glimpse of it on the train when we arrived but can't wait to see it up close.  

Now for some housecleaning...

We have lots of content to post but we are having internet issues.  Email is sketchy at times and the blog is er, um, BLOCKED!  Blogger is apparently off limits, along with other favorites like You Tube, Twitter and Facebook.  So, I'm trying a new approach, blog by email so we will see how it goes - the formatting may be a little off.

Oh, but I can access Flickr, so keep an eye on it for some of the latest photos -> http://www.flickr.com/photos/nolandtravels

That's all for now.  Happy travels.

So when do you decide to take a career break?

Before we dive into the Russia portion of our trip, I wanted to provide a little more detail on why we're taking a career break to travel and why we're doing it in this style (pretty much unplanned).  I know some of you think we're crazy (and we are) so we want to justify our madness.

It dates back a couple years…we'd been in London for over a year and knew we were already facing the end of Steph's secondment (but also thought we already wanted to stay longer).  We thought it would be perfect to take a break between living in the UK and US to travel.  When else are we going to have such an understandable break from work?  

Many people in the UK and Europe take gap years after they finish the equivalent of US high school and before starting university.  When various people told us about their own gap years it made us really think that Americans were missing a trick not doing the same.  We've all known people who weren't quite ready or mature enough for university and we've also grown to believe there is SO MUCH to be gained from travel.  Gap years are brilliant.  That concept is somewhat why we went to London in the first place.  

By the time we had matured enough in university to realize that some worldly travel might be really cool, we were both too far along in our studies to make it where we could not find a semester abroad that offered courses that would be suitable for both our degrees.  Missing that travel opportunity as a student was our one regret in life (so far!) which we remedied with moving to London  After moving to London and traveling quite frequently, we soon caught "the bug" and have been travel addicts since!  So with all of that in mind, we knew for sure that we had to take a break between the UK and US to travel.  We were also desperate to get to Asia since we were mainly traveling Europe while living in London.  One of our first ideas was in the post about the Oz bus. Sadly it went through some places that Americans shouldn't (and can't) go!  And we ultimately decided that would be way too much time on a bus covering ground and not enough time experiencing.    

After making the decision that 2011 would be our last year in London and delaying it from April to July to…multiple times!…things suddenly just fell in to place around September 2011.  I agreed a transfer to NYC and sabbatical of sorts and Steph's company let her go on a career break.  With almost more ease than moving to London in the first place, we had both arranged 6 months off and a move to NYC.  It's travel time! (by the way, "6 months" was the happy medium we both felt comfortable with - 3 months was clearly not enough given our travel wish list and a year seemed entirely too daunting)

In the three months leading up to the holiday season and our eventual departure from London, we had a lot on our plate.  Decisions, logistics, packing, sorting and getting rid of stuff to name a few things.  So in all of the hustle and bustle we needed a way to start the trip that would allow us to "ease" into traveling.  Different from the last few years of maximizing travel, we hoped to slow things down with a new type of travel - slow and unplanned!  

Why?

Well, we're both naturally "planners".  Steph has organized most* of our trips over the past five years, booking hotels and excursions and both of us reading and planning all of the many things we have to see and do.  So, we want to challenge ourselves a bit - throw ourselves in to the unknown.  

* In the more recent years, in being very busy with work and life we have set off on a couple trips absolutely last minute (booking 2 days before for Corfu, Greece) and completely unplanned (Zurich, this past summer) and they have turned out to be some of the most memorable and special trips we've had.  We're hoping that the same "enjoyment from the unexpected" will come from our unplanned long travel.

Where to start?

As the days counted down we started throwing out ideas.  Overall we knew we wanted to focus on Asia - Vietnam, India, China and ocean-front huts like in Tahiti or Bali were hot on our list. Steph came up with the winning plan after a few drinks late in a pub one night, "Let's start by celebrating Chinese New Year in China!" (She sends a special thanks to Nicholas for recommending this one…on another late night…in a pub with the obligatory curry afterwards).  Ok, sounds good but when is that?  For 2012 it is January 23rd.  The time line fits.  Ok, so where do we start?  Dunno.  

Then on a Saturday afternoon Steph dragged us to a travel store to investigate Round the World flights, trip insurance and travel vaccines...all the stuff that Steph is good at organizing.  While waiting for an agent, we were flipping through their Asia book and came across the Trans-Mongolian trip that ended in Beijing just before Chinese New Year.  Russia was always a place on of our list but somewhere along the way we just never really made happen for one reason or another.  We had already dismissed it for this long travel because we knew it would be way too cold to start there in January.  However, after reading that brochure blurb about it, we looked at each other and knew the Trans-Mongolian is where we wanted to start! 

So with eagerness the agent called us forward and already knowing a RTW flight probably wouldn't work for us since we wanted to do so much land travel, we quickly shifted the conversation to booking this particular Trans-Mongolian ending just in time for Chinese New Years.  He typed away on his screen and came back with a "sorry, I'm afraid its all booked up".  No!  Devastation!  

We then spent the next 2-3 days googling for any other company to offer a similar trip with roughly the same timelines but strangely it's not high season...  It was finally found, buried in the pages of google - a reputable company, offering a quality trip at a decent price.  Should we really go in January?  Really, it's going to be, excuse my English, bloody cold!?  So, Steph called upon a couple colleagues from Russia and asked if we were crazy for going to Russia in January.  They both said no, it's fine; Maria even thought London winters were worse because it was more humid and wet!  And my friend Oleg, while telling me I was crazy at the same time,  said it was a good time to go...  Alright then - book it!

Now, to buy a good coat and some waterproof winter boots from ebay!  (Steph sorted that by the way!)

Here is our rough itinerary starting the 31st of December 2011.  A big shout out to my brother and Tara for the great New Years Eve send off and the first leg of the journey!

Drive from Lexington to Cincinnati - 80 miles ( EST timezone basis )

Flight from Cincinnati to Chicago USA - 250 miles ( -1 timezone )

Flight from Chicago to London, United Kingdom - 3950 miles ( + 6 timezones )

Flight from London to St Petersburg, Russia - 1320 miles ( + 3 timezones )

4 days in St Petersburg then overnight train to Moscow - 404 miles

4 days in Moscow then 24 hour train to Yekaterinburg -1,128 miles ( + 2 timezones  )

3 days in Yekaterinburg then 79 hour train to Ulaabaatar, Mongolia - 2,786 miles ( + 3 timezones )

2 days in Ulaabaatar then 24 hour train to Beijing, China - 972 miles ( same as Mongolia, EST + 13 )

Then a few days in Beijing to see us through Chinese New Year, hopefully catching up with my colleague and his wife.

By my count that's roughly 11,000 miles as the crow flies and 13 timezones in 20 days! Yep we are insane but loving it!

So, stay tuned for more because not even we know what's next!  Well after the 24th of January anyway… :)

We made it to Mongolia - wow, it's cold!

When initially planning this trip, we knew that it would be cold in Russia and really cold in Mongolia.  It's the heart of winter but we saw it as an extreme experience that we wanted to try.

Luckily we were able to edge our way in to the extreme cold.  St Petes and Moscow were hanging around 19 F (-7 C) and Yekaterinburg was around 7 F (-14 C).  The latter proving cold enough to where I got a little hesitant when it came to wondering around looking for food!

So, when we arrived at the train station in Ulaanbaatar at 6:30 in the morning, before the sun was up - wow!  That was cold,  -16 F (-27 C).  A simple breath in and you instantly felt your nose hairs freeze.  You almost felt scared for your lungs!  The fabrics on our coats even changed from a gentle woosh-woosh sound when walking to a crinkly, crackly plastic crunchy sound!  After a few minutes wandering around on the platform looking for our driver, cheeks tingling, the cold had already gone through our gloves!  Later that morning when we jumped out of the van for a quick walk across the main city square, within 10 minutes Josh had nice ice-cycles developing on his beard!

We will post a bit more later about the details of what we got up to in these extreme temperatures, but this morning at the Ger Lodge, out in the countryside, it was -29 F (-34 C) with the sun just up!  Needless to say, the night before when Josh tried to take some long exposure star trail photos, he only managed the one photo below before jumping back in the Ger before both him and the camera started to freeze over!

It's really been an amazing experience here in Mongolia, even if brief.  We head off tomorrow morning bound for Beijing in the last leg of our Trans-Mongolian journey!

Trip Update and Progress

Today is our last day in Yekateringburg and really our last day in Russia.  Just after midnight tonight we board the train for Mongolia but it takes 70+ straight hours on the train to get there.  Yep, a little over 3 days with only a few 20 minute stops until we reach Ulaanbaatar.  Hopefully we should be able to put together a nice collection of blogs while we're on the long train journey because we have some good photos and stories to share.

The days are flying by!  On top of the short winter days, its light about 10am and dark again at about 5pm, we've been going at a strong pace. Yesterday was dog sledding in the Urals forest and today was ice fishing at Sharkash Lake, where Steph pulled off a pretty good trick (we'll let the suspense build...).  And all of this after our last manic months in London and a busy Christmas home means we're actually really looking forward to some rest on the train.

The forecast for Mongolia is...well, COLD, about -18 Celsius or 0 Farenheit, with night time lows of -30 C / -24 F!  Yikes!

So, with our bags packed and loaded down with some typical train food (pot noodles, sweets to share, vodka, etc) we're ready for the longest train journey we'll probably ever take, across stunning Siberia!

In the meantime here are a few photos because I've got to go. Steph just took her last shower for a few days and now its my turn... 

(Photos below:  Josh climbing a snow pile in front of Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow, our first train dinner on the train from Moscow to Ekaterinburg and us standing on the Europe/Asia continental divide)

 

 

 

 

Merry Moscovian Christmas!

Merry Christmas (in Russia, anyway)!!  Today is Christmas day in Russia since they celebrate according to the Julian calendar which is 13 days later than the newer Gregorian calendar that we follow.  It's been good fun being here during this time as the country is enjoying 10 days of holiday and there are lots of Christmas stalls, lights, decor, events, etc going on.

Last night (Christmast Eve), we were in Red Square enjoying the sights and sounds when we heard choir singing from one of the smaller churches on the edge of the square.  We decided to go in and found ourselves in the midst of an amazing candlelit Russian Orthodox Christmas service.  We were on our tiptoes trying to see in to the really small center room where the service was being held (maybe 50 people max standing inside!) and a guy came by saying something in Russian pushing people out of the door and back in the entry hall.  We thought we were being ushered out but then everyone just made a uniform space in the entry hall and we realized the Bishop and priests, in their fabulous gold and cream robes, were making a processional around the church halls - swinging incense and bells and carrying large candles.  We felt so lucky to have caught this moment - it was amazing to see the Russian Orthodox celebration of Christmas.

In addition to catching this service, we also captured some fairly good photos.  Merry Moscovian Christmas!

The start of a new journey: Welcome to Russia!

Well, I think I promised many of you interesting stories from our travels and so as to not disappoint - I wanted to start you off with our first travel challenge - how do you pack when 90% of your travel gear is stuck in US customs after having been shipped over from the UK?  Answer: Scramble and buy new stuff!  So that's what we did in our last few manic days at home before setting off!  A few trips to Goodwill, Walmart and various sports stores to pick up the bare minimum.  However, we think this helped us pack lighter.  Let us know if you all know of anyone in the market for a near complete used set of travel gear in about 6 months...

So after the slight packing challenge we boarded our flight and set off.  In an ironic twist, we changed in London which was odd arriving but not staying there!

Then we arrived in St Petersburg, Russia on the evening of 2 January.  We were a little disappointed that there wasn't any snow but mother nature had a little surprise for us the next morning!  Here is a picture to set the scene - we'll post more about what we got up to later...we have to go catch our 10pm overnight train to Moscow!

Welcome to Russia!