Hi All, Woke up in our Ger, which was freezing even though I was stoking the fire all night. Our Ger was situated in Gorkhi-Terelj National park. We headed for a breakfast of bread, jam, cheese (slices yuck) and then sausage and fried egg, this seems to be the Mongolian breakfast staple. We then headed out to see the rock formation Turtle Rock, which by chance looked just like a turtle!!! We were allowed to climb up to a cave in the rock where they store meat in the summer. It was good climbing it as you can see by the photos (Vicky’s spider man silhouette was good). We then headed to the 40-meter Chinggis Khaan statue, recently built in 2008; you may think we spelt it wrong but that is the correct Mongolian spelling not ... read more

Hello All, We had a long day on the train, we had a few hours each side of the Russian-Mongolian boarder but there was really nothing there apart from a kiosk with out-of-date items. So our day was spent eating noodles, watching spooks and reading, plus loads of chatting!!! To be fair this time we all got healthier foods for the train like tomatoes, cheese, bread, fruit and other good stuff. Our passports and visas were checked thoroughly, about 6 times; nice to see they are thorough unlike England. Anyone planning to do this trip should really look at making sure they have books, kindle, laptop or something to keep themselves busy, also stock up on food as its expensive on the train and will be cheaper in a supermarket in Russia. As normal we ended ... read more

Hello All, So today we have reached Lake Baikal. We were all really tired after a horrible night sleep on the train due to people coming and going at lots of station stops throughout the night. Jo had a Russian women think it was acceptable to sit on her bed at 3am after a swift kick she moved but on to Neil's bed....Russians have very limited social awareness!!! We arrived into a quaint little village Listvyanka, lake Baikal with the snow topped mountains in the background, it looks beautiful here. Its also not as cold as we thought it would be-bonus for Vicky :) It was -15 degrees 4 days ago and now a comfortable -2 which is T-shrt weather!! We set out straight away with the group and the honcho (who was very hungover from ... read more

Today we have arrived in Moscow, the Russian Capital!!! The train arrived spot on time at 0830 and after we both had a good nights sleep on the sleeper train (hope the 12 days on this next one are as easy). So our start in Moscow did not go as planned we got the metro from the train station after a massive hike, then went the wrong way on the metro, then could not find the brown coloured metro, then got stuck in a massive queue (was mental Vicky nearly got trampled alive) but eventually we got to the station close to our hostel....or so we thought!!! So after standing around and trying to "get in the map" (my friends quote went over Vicky's head) we asked a few people who didn't really help after walking ... read more

Hi all! Didn't have a brilliant night sleep, the dorm of 10 had people coming and going all night it seemed; then there is always that one person that snores and sleep talks :( Fortunately that person was Neil waking up the rest of the room with his noises so I had permission to punch him every time I was just starting to drift off again since the last snort! Anyway, woke up to meet Anna our honcho (tour guide) who took us on a marathon site seeing day of the city: -Hermitage Museum seeing the priceless painting 'Madonna and child' by Da Vinci. -Peter and Pauls Fortress -St Isaac's Cathedral (262 steps for great panoramic views) -Church of Spilled blood We went to lunch for a traditional Russian omelette thing (potato pancakes AKA rosti's) and ... read more