back on the train again

After six great weeks in Mongolia it was time to get back on the train again and move on to a new country. It should be China.

After two relaxed days in Ulan Bator, I took a taxi together with an english guy from my hostel at 6 am to the trainstation, where it was already quite busy. When I arrived at the trainstation I met Aio, a swiss guy, living in Canada, who was travelling with his wife. I knew him already from Ulan Bator. It turned out that I was sharing the same compartment with them. Luckily it was only three of us, so we had some extra space for our luggage.

After we put all our luggage in the foreseen places, the steward came and told us that we need to change the compartment. We don’t know why, but they should know it.

We spent most of the day with sleeping, reading, talking and playing cards. In the evening we arrived in Zamyn-Uud, the city on the mongolian border. It took them almost two hours to complete the immigration process for the whole train. After that we where allowed to cross the border. First the train stopped, some chinese border agents came on the train and collected our passports.

The next three hours a procedure followed, which I knew already from the border between Poland and Belarus: As Mongolia, as well as Russia, is running a different track system, they had to change the bogies. Although it was very hot in the waggon, because they turned off all electricity, so also the A/C, and the toilets where closed too, it was quite interesting to watch the process. Three hours later the train was ready to move on to the chinese railwaysystem.

The train stopped for one hour in the chinese border city Erlian, where we could spend and/or exchange our last mongolian money. It was great to get out of the train again. Around midnight, we continued our journey to Beijing, where we should arrive the next day around lunch time.

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