This is the first part of the journey where we tread on familiar ground. Although there's nothing particularly new to see it will be interesting to see how things have changed over the last five years. Five years isn't such a long time, but this is China. While the rest of the world spiralled into an economic black hole it has boomed, it also hosted the Olympics only a couple of years ago, seemingly using this as a springboard (excuse the pun) to leave it's old image as a developing nation behind and forge ahead creating a new identity, comfortably nestled amongst the rest of the worlds superpowers. There were mass media reports on how they were going to change the behaviour of the local populace, conforming to the western notions of order and manners. It'll ... read more

Moscow, ridiculous prices, riddled with corruption and filled with new Russian millionaires. These thoughts fade away while standing in the grand space that is Red Square. The Kremlin, the Apex of Russian political power dominates one side of the square, the huge ornate GUM shopping centre graces the opposing side and at the far end with its distinctive architecture, the colourful domes of St Basils Cathedral keep drawing your attention. These landmarks scream Russia more than anything else we've seen. The sky darkens and the blue skies fade away, the wind whips around our legs rapidly gaining force and a few snowflakes begin to fall, is this the start of something that will make, such a beautiful sight even more magical? The few flakes rapidly turn into a blizzard, the wind forces them horizontally into our ... read more

Tallinn, our final stop on our journey through the Baltic States and the final capital in the chain. After this visit we can compare all three and decide which one we prefer. We arrived at the bus station and started walking to our hotel which we’d pre-booked over the internet the day before. We had a little trouble finding any reasonably priced accommodation in Tallinn, which we assumed was because it was the weekend, it’s actually because Tallinn is an expensive destination. The hotel was the first clue, the second clue came when we withdrew money and the ATM spat out euro notes rather than the Estonian Krooni which we were expecting. It turned out that beginning 1 January 2011, Estonia adopted the euro and became the 17th eurozone member state. This was not good news ... read more

9 hours pass and we're standing in the freezing cold of Lithuania's capital, Vilnius. The bus journey was OK but only for the boys as Faye and I gave up our seats and sat on the floor so that they could lie across them. Grumpy, tired adults are fine as they don't tend to be too vocal, kids on the other hand turn into absolute monsters if they don't get enough sleep, so it seemed the logical approach. It did highlight a big difference between Nate and Gabe though. We didn't catch the bus till 8.30pm which is way past their bed time, Nate was fine with this, thriving on the chaos that surrounds organising oneself for a long journey, Gabe on the other hand was just getting more and more pissed off that he hadn't ... read more

We're in Berlin already... We cheated! When we were originally planning this trip we had every intention of making our way into Asia without taking a single flight.  This isn't hard to do at all as overland connections through Europe into Russia and onwards are numerous and fairly straightforward.  The problem came while browsing the Easyjet website, it was cheaper to get a flight to Berlin than it was to get a train ticket to London from where we live.  We'd save on the eurotunnel fare and the train journey between Paris/Brussels (depending on which route we decided to go) and Berlin.  I know that's not really the point, but getting to Asia with as much money left in our pockets was a bigger priority to us.   We wouldn't miss out on too much ... read more