In Mongolia

No luck finding a Gobi trip yet.  Today, I'm headed to the Black Market.  It's not really a "Black" market, but that's what they call it.  Then maybe some museums and a Monastery. 

Trans-Mongolian Railway

The train pulled out a 7:45 am. It's my home until sometime on Tuesday afternoon. I'm sharing a compartment with a German girl, Steph, who is doing 4 day stopover in Mongolia and continuing on to Moscow.

The train is fairly empty, if Steph had not bought a ticket a few days ago, I'd have the compartment to myself. Though I'm quite happy to have the company.

UB had heavy snow, which I'm not ready for. I bought some long
underwear yesterday and will buy more warm clothes and maybe some boots in UB. It depends on what kind of trip I can put together. I really want to go to the Gobi or at least I did until it got so cold. The cold came early this year I think.

I've not done a train trip like this since I backpacked through
Europe, eastern Europe and Turkey in the late '90s.

Bye Bye Beijing

I left Beijing this morning, bright and early. It's a great city. I
hadn't planned on being ther so long or liking it so much. I'm not
sure what I expected, but certainly my expectations were exceeded.

It's a very clean city, the people seem happy and I found some
pleasant suprises. I may be back after Mongolia.

New China Museum of Science And Technology

Today was the opening day. I went, the line was hell, a good hour
long. It was worth it! It rivals most any other science museum I've
been to. Lots of interactive stuff, lots of cool stuff. Picts to be
posted.

The Other Great Wall

I can't get to facebook, blogger, youtube and other stuff. China is
serious about sensorship. It's annoying. Finding proxys is a bitch as.

The Traveler's Blues

It happens sooner or later on every long trip. You have crap day and don't really want to be traveling. It happened to me two daya ago.

Everything went wrong for most of the day and after a while it got me down. Then... I went to see the Chinese Acrobats and was restored to harmony. Wow, was that a great show. It was there experimental show for up and coming stars and we had third row seats.

Smog!

My first two days were smog free. Today it's so smoggy, I can't see things farther than 100 feet here at the Olympic green. I'm trying to find the new science and tech museum.