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Wednesday 27th August - Shanghai
After 3 fantastic years in the Philippines, at 10pm on the 22nd August, we flew out of Manila for the last time. We can't thank the people of Manila enough for making our stay so memorable.
So as per normal we booked the s***tiest flights we could find leaving from a small rundown terminal that we didn't even know existed. AirAsia leaving Manila at 10pm, arriving Shanghai at 1am - we continue to punish ourselves for no apparent reason. After getting through Immigration and Customs, finding a taxi, paying the taxi an exorbitant amount, we finally got to our hostel at about 2am. Checked in, straight to bed. We slept in till about 10am and then went and found some breakfast/brunch. Unfortunately we didn't have a lot of time in Shanghai to do any sightseeing as we were booked on a hard sleeper train to Xi'an at 3pm - oh this is going to be so much fun………
So 3pm we jumped on the train. The hard sleeper carriage consists of a cubicle about 2m wide, a total of 6 beds (2 rows of 3) with about 800mm gap between them and then this repeated about 15 times down the length of the carriage. So there is kids running around everywhere, people smoking between the carriages because apparently the bit between the carriages doesn't count as part of the train and you can't smoke on the train - go figure. And the toilets, let's not go there. So we ate our instant noodles and tried to get comfortable. Brenden made an effort to write the Nepal blog as we'd been pretty lazy in updating that and Jodi read for a few hours before both of us settling down for the night.
Thursday 28th August - Xi'an
After 2 people snoring for the majority of the train trip, the amount of sleep we both got wasn't exactly comforting. Nonetheless we devoured our last packet of instant noodles and arrived in Xi'an at about 9am. Our transport for the hostel was there to greet us at the train station and we arrived at Hang Tan Hostel shortly after. This hostel was actually really cool, great atmosphere, cheap, clean - definitely recommend it if you happen to travel to Xi'an. We moved the enormous amount of luggage we decided to bring with us (about 50kg) into the dorm room at about 10am and woke everyone up that was asleep in there. Oh well, they should have been awake by then……
After showering and making ourselves feel somewhat human, we left the hostel, found some lunch before boarding one of the local buses to the Terracotta Army. Takes about 1.5hrs on the bus to get there but only costs about 7 Yuan - about $1.20. We couldn't believe how cheap the buses are in China, and not just in Xi'an but all over China including Beijing.
The Terracotta Army is quite spectacular. There is a total of 3 pits that they've excavated and if you happen to do it we recommend you leave Pit No. 1 until the last as that as the most spectacular. We did that one first and then were a little bit disappointed with the rest of the pits. However the bronze chariots are pretty cool. It costs about $35 to get in and is a little overpriced for what you get but it's one of those bucket-list items really so we had to do it. It is worth the visit though, what they built is quite spectacular.
Friday 29th August - Mt Huashan
We were up early, about 6am, trying not wake everyone in the dorm room. We actually packed our bags the night before so we limited the amount of noise we made. We dumped most of our stuff in the hostel storage room and then made our way to the train station with 1 bag and the camera for our 8.15am train to Huashan, about 1.5 hours travelling time. So this time we booked a hard seater instead of a hard sleeper. What we didn't know about the hard seater trains is that they also sell standing tickets for the carriage. So we were one of the last people to board the train as we f***ed around in the station getting breakfast and not knowing what waiting room we were supposed to be in. As a result, we couldn't actually board the carriage we were supposed to be on as the aisle had filled up with 'standers' and no one could actually get on the carriage. So we ended up jumping on the train about 3 carriages from where were were supposed to be and then having to push our way through all the 'standers' and their luggage they had just placed in the aisle until we found our seats. The look on the people's face that were in our seats was priceless when they realised that we had booked those seats. They thought they had scored a couple of seats whilst only paying for standing tickets. Sorry f***ers!!!
The train ride wasn't the most comfortable as there were suitcases and bags in and around our feet as there just isn't enough room for everyones luggage in the shelves above the seats. Anyway, the entertainment was quite different. So it turns out that in each carriage there is a basically a stand up comedian that get's up and starts telling stories and jokes for about an hour. Then he tries and sells his books and DVD's to anyone that found him funny. Then after he's finished, he goes onto the next carriage and swaps with the guy that just did the same thing in that carriage. Well we didn't understand anything the guy said but it was still funny watching all the Chinese laugh. It's somewhat infectious isn't it, watching people laugh and then laughing yourself even though you don't know what they're laughing at……. The girl next to Brenden also spoke reasonable English so she was trying to teach us some Chinese. They were all laughing at that as well…………
10.30 we arrived in Huashan and then after 2 taxi rides and 1 argument we finally arrived at the Mt Huashan Visitor Centre to get our mountain passes. We bought our tickets, had some lunch, checked our wallet for enough money and started trekking at about midday - the most appropriate time of the day for trekking. We both sweated our rings out for 6 hours. In total we climbed over 2000m in elevation. Some of the stairs make Annapurna Base Camp look like a speed bump. The scenery is amazing though and completely different to ABC.
We ended up checking into the hostel at Eastern Peak for the night. 150 Yuan each for a bed for the night. Hmmm, we better check how much money we have. f***, we've done it again, it's Annapurna Base Camp all over again. We had just enough money for dinner, breakfast and the chair lift back down. We haven't learnt have we. We did however run into James and Cale, a Pommy and Australian we met at the hostel the night before. I guess if we got really stuck we could ask them for some cash. But yet again, no beer for the night….. :(
Saturday 30th August - Mt Huashan
After another night of f***-all sleep due to people snoring, coughing and spitting in the dorm, we got up at 5am to try and catch the sunrise. Unfortunately it was more of a 'cloud' rise as wasn't really worth getting up for. Oh well, breakfast and then off to walk the 'Death Trail'………
Alright so most of you reading this have seen the Facebook post (thank you you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you for all the 'likes' and comments) of this and if you haven't, we've uploaded a video to the blog site to show you what it's all about. It's been nominated the most dangerous walk in the world. You walk along the side of a cliff on a path 3 pieces of wood wide and a chain to hang on to. Up until about 5 years ago, there wasn't the safety harness there either. Any slip and it's certain death. For obvious reasons, both sets of parents weren't aware of us doing this :) Ideally it would have been good to do this at the end of our trip as if the worst did happen we would have experienced all of Europe before we fell into the abyss. Anyway, didn't end up that way.
Now as Brenden was wearing the GoPro for the entire walk, you don't actually get to see the shear terror in his eyes. Both legs had the shakes, "Holy f***" and "Holy s***" were about the only words that were coming out of his mouth and he's never gripped a chain so hard in his life. Now Jodi seemed to handle the terror a little bit better but admittedly was still s***ting her pants. The weather wasn't helping the cause either. It was raining and windy, just the sort of weather you want when you're on the side of a cliff. The worst thing about the whole walk is that it's the only path to a certain area of the cliff, this means it's 2 way on the plank. So you've constantly either going under someone's harness lines against the cliff, or they're going under yours as you go on the outside of them. One of the worst areas is where there is no planks of wood and you're only standing in the foot holes dug out in the side of the cliff. And Granite is so 'grippy' when it's wet - NOT!!!!
If you look at the video closely there are a couple of interesting moments. On the way down on the ladder Jodi steps on Brenden's hand - such a lovely partner she is. When we get overtaken by one of the Chinese people on the way back, if you look closely he unhooks both of his harness safety lines at the same time - nutter. The American we passed towards the end of the walk was David, a guy we met at our hostel. And the guy at the start of the video, James from our hostel, actually did 70% of the plank walk without the harness connected at all - crazy f***er!!!!!!!
Anyway, obviously we both survived and we're both really glad we did it. Brenden did have vertigo for the rest of the day though and wouldn't walk anywhere near the edge of a cliff to take any photos. And Jodi had trouble sleeping that night as she'd wake up to that falling sensation we've all experienced. If you end up in China, take the time to do this walk - the adrenaline you experience after is like nothing else you've ever done. Skydiving doesn't even come close.
So after the 'Death Trail' we made our way around to South Peak, then to West Peak and then to West Peak Chair Lift, one of 2 chair lifts off the mountain. f***, we didn't have enough money for this one and for some reason our credit cards wouldn't work with their system either. s***, OK, so we'll have to walk down to North Peak and get the chair lift from there. It wasn't so much the walking that was the problem but we had a 1.30pm train back to Xi'an that we had to be on. Alright so we legged it down the mountain to the 2nd chair lift. 80 Yuan each, about $15 - yep, no problem. So we bought the tickets and then got down the bottom where the buses were waiting to take us back to the visitor information centre. Now, we had assumed that these buses were free but when we got there we found out it was 20 Yuan each. Crap, we hadn't planned on this. So we opened the wallet and counted the money out. 37, 38, 39, 40. Awesome we had just enough. And when we say just enough we mean exactly that. We had 5 Wu Jiao in our wallet - that's 1/2 Yuan, less than 10 cents. There's 2 ways to look at this. We are either extremely good at budgeting for our trips or extremely bad. We'll let you decide :)
We made it back to Xi'an that afternoon, checked back into our hostel, then showered and cleaned up. Relatively early night, we were both f***ed from the last 2 days.
Sunday 31st August - Huashan to Beijing
Yet again we didn't sleep that much the night before due to one of the occupants in the dorm snoring his head off. This was quite possibly the loudest snoring we had ever heard though. At one point everyone else in the dorm was awake and up looking at this guy in disbelief. Friends from Maryborough will understand the next comment - his snoring was worse than one of the Sanders brothers. Won't say exactly who but we all know ;)
That morning we watched the GoPro footage of the death walk. Yeah, we still had butterflies in our stomach and struggled to watch it all the way through.
That afternoon we got the high speed train to Beijing. Not as classy as the ones in Japan but still much better than the hard sleepers we'd been getting. Trip took about 5 hours so enough time to sit back and relax. By the time we got to Beijing is was pissing down with rain. So we grabbed a bus (1 Yuan) and about 20 minutes later we got off at Tiannamen Square and walked about 15 minutes to our hostel. By the time we got there we looked like drowned rats. Checked-in, had dinner and crashed out. Fortunately we had the dorm room to ourselves so we actually got some sleep.
Monday 1st September - Beijing
Up early and off to see the Wall. We ended up deciding to go to Mutianyu based on advice from other travellers. Supposably this section of the wall isn't as busy at the other areas. Obviously a lot of it has been restored but any way. Our first impressions were that we thought it would be bigger. Not in length but in height and width. But then when you stand up on the top and look down you realise that it's near impossible for someone to climb up. The position of the wall at the top of the mountain also provides additional advantages. We ended up spending about 3 hours walking along the wall. Unfortunately the weather was not the nicest so the pictures didn't turn out as we wanted but it is amazing and is worth the visit. You also get to take a 'luge' down the hill on the way back down to the bus, which is far more exciting than getting the chair lift back down.
Unfortunately we had some more occupants check-in to our dorm that night so we didn't get the place to ourselves. The snoring wasn't so bad though.
Tuesday 2nd September - Beijing
So the plan for today was pick up our tickets for the train the following day, take some photos of Tianamen Square and The Forbidden City, head out to the Olympic Village and have a look at the Bird's Nest Stadium and the Water Cube, than transfer to the Sofitel to enjoy one last night of luxury. But of course, it f***ing rained all day!!! So we only managed to pick up our tickets, buy some artwork, mail the artwork home and then transfer to the Sofitel. We looked so out of placed when we walked into the lobby. We looked like 2 pack mules with all our luggage strapped to us, plus we were pretty wet from walking in the rain. Anyway the room was free thanks to Jodi's Accor membership we'd purchased about 12 months earlier. Oh and did we make the most of the luxuries!!! Within 10 minutes we had the bath filled to the top with hot water and we just soaked in it. Plus we had a king size bed to sleep in that night and even better was we weren't sharing the room with anyone else so we didn't have to put up with anyone snoring.
Wednesday 3rd September - Beijing to Mongolia
Finally the day had arrived. Trans-Mongolian Express from Beijing to Moscow, with a few stops in Mongolia and Russia. We had the biggest breakfast we could possibly stomach from the hotel buffet, which we might add was the best f***ing buffet breakfast we'd both ever eaten. And thanks to Jodi's membership card, it was 50% off too.
We checked-out and then made our way to the the train station. The plan was to get money out of the ATM's at the train station but for some reason the travel money cards wouldn't work. Wasn't sure if it was the bank or the ATM. Anyway so we had to make do with the money we had in our wallet, which again wasn't very much, and buy our rations for the train trip. This first leg to Ulan Baatar was 27 hours so we had to basically get 3 full meals. So we stocked up on some fruit and the standard cup noodles we'd been eating on all our train trips thus far and then jumped on the train. Bonus - we managed to get the sleeper to ourselves. And get this, the person next to us was the son of the one of the teachers, Cheryl Parry, from the British School in Manila travelling back to the UK. Small world.
The scenery out the window once you leave Beijing is beautiful. The train starts off going through mountains and tunnels and then slowly the scenery transforms into rolling grassy hills as you get closer to Mongolia. The biggest thing we noticed was the amount of Wind Farms you see along the track. There are heaps of them. We'd always thought China just bought all our coal and burned it.
Another Bonus - when we first got on the train we got 2 free lunch and dinner vouchers for the dining car for reasons we don't know. Oh we wouldn't go hungry this trip….. (for a change)
That night we would cross the border into Mongolia.
Monopoly Deal running total
Brenden: 9
Jodi: 4
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