The final stop to my Asia trip following just under four months of intensive travel throughout its range. We had visited Bali possibly 11 years earlier and in spite the memories of a child are never all that accurate, certain aspect strook me. The airport which I remebered as small and quaint has become a endlessly extended building taking in the largest Boeings. I arrived and headed to Kuta, centre of the toursit life, and with suprising difficulty shared accomodation as in spite being low season the hotels and steets still seem filled and booked out. The beach is a long [View Full Entry]

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Flew into Singapore and must confess I was dissapointed at first. i had anticipated the so spoken about cleansiness and fervant complicance to laws but found a place resonably clean but certainly very uncontrolled in respect to trafic and people. Singapore is quite small but suprsingly diverse. It seemed at first alike to Bangkok but actualy the more I went to the center the greater the change. I was unforunatelly staying in the less upkept areas therefore natrually it was a suprise but then the apprence of colonial buildings, tradition neatly blended with a genuenly booming in construction [View Full Entry]

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Its been a while since I have last written but time has come to complete the Asian leg of my trip. South Corea I arrived and spend a couple of days discovering the city. I was strook by how impeccably clean everthing was and the very much german engeneering styled perfection in their road infrastructure. Unlike China, Seouls temples where more humble, but not only due to the uncomparable size difference of the territories but particularily in the humility and subtlness of the architechture. Far less imposing bringing a more relaxing and not overwhelming sights. Taking a tour to the Dem [View Full Entry]

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Well the journey south was very pleasant with comfortable hard sleeper bunks, quite a luxury in comparative to the standing or hard seats. I arrived early in Nanjing and tried to find accommodation but having been unsuccessful decided to continue straight to Shanghai the same evening and visit the town throughout the day. Nanjing is and odd town, very developed with the 9th tallest skyscraper in the world and on the other hand very much peasant population and 70's communism behavior. The city is huge and the transport incomprehensible though walking is often a good option. There is a sur [View Full Entry]

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This little street where the hostel was located, just 750 meters from Tian an Men square (the main square of Beijing and the largest in the world), was completely in rubles and earth when I arrived. By the time I left, it was nearly finished entirely (about 300 meters long and 5 meters wide). Chinese work very hard day and night. Very impressive but odd to another extent when these workers come from out of town work for little wages and then subject to the temptations and delights of the city. Communism is still alive in some aspects. I met a [View Full Entry]

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Kashgar is nothing like I had ever expected. The first thing when I crossed the border from China, I saw, was a line of camels transporting goods across some rather rugged terrain. Kashgar is by no means real China. The Arabic writing, the dark complection of everyone, the attitude, the streets, the cloth, quite essentially everything and anything is more or less like I would imagine Marroco or Cairo to be like. Unbelievable thought culturally really interesting. Due to the unrest in Urumqi just a month earlier (whereby several hundreds were killed triggered by ethnic fighting between Uighur [View Full Entry]

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Well it has been a long time that I have not updated my blog but hopefully my memory will not be too poor at remembering the twist in the various stages that have gone by one my trip. After Karakol with the french family with whom I was traveling for that week we went to Chopon-Ata, a hub of Russian-Khazak holiday makers. The difference is tremendous going from quiet streets and rather useless boulevards to a dis-organized but booming little town with nightclubs, beaches and countless rather fine restaurants. At the same time was a summit of 8 "presidents" composed essentially [View Full Entry]

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Finally back on my blog. It is not all that easy to conect and when so only limited time available so I appologise for the delay. Obtaining the Tajik visa was suprisingly easy thought as I went though a travel agency (only way for tourists to get hold of one) they charged me a lot. Wanting to travel to the more remote region of the Pamirs they require a further permit but having some time on my hands I decided to attempt to obtain it in Dushanbe (the capital). At the agency i met an american wanting to travel the 600km [View Full Entry]

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It has been a while since I last updated this thought the very busy schedule and the complete lack of access to internet renders the updating difficult. Its been a facinating crossing, leaving Russia going through Khazakstan and crossing all of Uzbekistan. The train journey lasted 46 hours from Astrakhan but it is just a fantastic experience. One dosn't see all that much outside but it is more the life inside the train which makes it so memorable and eventfull. The train left and I travelled with some really funny and entertaining locals most of whom were heading towards Aktau (smallish [View Full Entry]

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Moscow - Volgograd 21hours... Train journey seem to be a lot of fun thought the heat at day reaching 36 to 38c can be a little overwhelming. People are friendly and gladly share they portions between one another. Speaking no russian makes it only that much more fun and entertaining... it is really travelling with the odrinary average russian across trully amazing time speared regions. Volgograd (ex-Stalingrad) Imagine a city new of the 60's with virtually nothing old. The Stalinist environment and structure of the town makes it a strange sight. Its is not as ugly as one could imagine as [View Full Entry]

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