Mongolia -> China

October 10, 2010: After a short night I got up at 5:30 a.m., packed up the last of my stuff and said goodbye to Cathy. It took a while, but even at that hour I eventually found a taxi to take me to the station. I shared my compartment with two Dutch people from a tour group and with Ian, a true globetrotter. Among other things, he and his wife had spent seven years sailing around the world, and he told me about many, many other adventures while our train crossed the Gobi Desert.

Only now and then did we stop, in almost deserted places.

Finally we reached the Mongolian-Chinese border, where the station welcomed us in almost correct English (the lettering on the right in the photo).

Border formalities, including switching the carriages to the new track gauge, took more than six hours.

October 11, 2010: After a very pleasant night, thanks to my earplugs, I was in for a surprise: after the endless birch forests of Russia and the barren deserts of Mongolia, China greeted me with beautiful, wonderfully varied scenery.

Having arrived in Beijing shortly after 2 p.m., I said goodbye to my new acquaintances, and my new couchsurfing host picked me up at the exit of Beijing’s main railway station.