Who needs the Vodka Train?

Wow......... so we've arrived... To be honest I couldn't tell you how many kilometres I've travelled without checking but I spent 8 straight nights on trains and I didn't have a real shower for all that time so perhaps the actual mileage doesn't count for as much as you'd think.........

This is going to be a rubbish round up so I apologise - I have to get the travel companions up to do some exploring (and get some breakfast) soon.........

The Leaving Week

Again, sorry for the brevity because I enjoyed my last week so much I almost didn't leave! It started of with being at my Mum's in Llandeilo, just hanging out with the fams and drinking vino.... ah lovely :-). Me and mum spent the day together on Monday and have ice cream, i had LAVENDER flavour (starting off the new experiences before even leaving). I came back on Tuesday for the last Thirsty Squid which was weird (still not used to saying "ah, see you in a year or so"!

Wednesday was my last winter nets for our cricket team. I thought I smacked it by baking little oatie-cookie things but Amy went and topped me by baking this GORGEOUS carrot cate with butter icing and walnuts... oh my god I wish I could have eaten more, but it was preceded by a lovely spread in the pub of sandwiches and chips which I sort of gorged myself on.... woops. Anyway again, really sad, I'm so gutted I'm not involved in this season's work, it's going to be amazing!

Thursday morning and so begins the travel adventure, with a whistlestop foray into Edinburgh, a city where I've never been but always wanted to go.... Sophie, Hannah and myself stayed in a lovely little hostel right near the Royal Mile, and all the vintage shops (The mantra "don't buy if you can't pack" was going round my head like a broken record"). We basically chilled, went out exlporing, drinking coffee, eating food, drinking and dancing. Oh and we walked up that big hill by Holyrood). I'm gutted I haven't got any pictures - I may add some later when I have more time.........

The Journey

So.... We begin:

(I'm really sorry, i can't work out the stuff with the images, but please try and work out which quote with which pic....)


The buddies at St Pancras, 6.30 Sunday night


The Reichstag into which Len tried to sneak a penknife (unintentionally).... they spotted it at security, and were totally cool. Rob had a rollie behind his ear that another security guard thought was a joint.


Len in the holocaust memorial in Berlin - very humbling.


The beautiful beer and pizza in Warsaw, after hours on the train with no food and no water, hence the best pizza I ever had in my life


The Moscow Metro, definitely the highlight of our hour-an-a-half in the city - the most amazingly ornate transportation system I've ever seen!! And we had a guide too, to help us go in the right direction, the lovely Sergei (who also helped us with our customs forms which were all in Russian....)


Our first night's party (l-r Dima's arm, Emily, Alex, Frances, Rob, me, Sacha).

On the train we were sharing a cabin with a lovely Ukrainian/Russian guy called Dima, whoc taught us the most important word in Russian (phonetically: ZA-VASCH-AS-DA-ROV-YA - CHEERS!)

At one station we sneaked into the guards cabin to try on his hat:


Rob


Ang


....Len


Dima


Omsk station


The Big Party - I'm not entirely sure how many bottles of vodka were drunk but it was a lot. Many Swedes came to joing in the party....


We found a ukelele!! The Norwegian girls had a very pretty one, len nicked it.

Rob was the principle party-gatherer, a whole different bunch of Scandanvians turned up at one point, asking "Hey, where's Crazy Rob?!?". He was here:



Advertising vs. reality: I wasn't even eating these noodles but I was still sick of them from all the smell and complaining!


Sunrise over Lake Baikal - the deepest lake in the world holding 20% of the world's freshwater!


The dining car attached in Mongolia. I heard an angel chorus when I walked in....


Sunset out the back of the train over the Gobi Desert



BEIJING!!

We followed a fellow trans-mongolia traveller to his hostel and found this little wonder - SO SO lovely, and I'm not kidding, the wall of the Forbidden City is just at the end of the alley!!

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