Mongolia
Day 10-11-12: The train, the border and travelling to Irkust/Listvyanka
After saying goodbye to Ulaanbaatar on the eve of day 10 we boarded the train bound for our next destination, Irkust. Getting on the train was easy, we found our cabin (which we were sharing with the Chileans) and started to settle in. However trying to settle in resulted in a bit of a shock […]
Day 9-10: Ulaanbaatar
The last night at the ger lodge was a good one – we were not being roasted alive in the ger! We packed our things and with our Chilean friends (and a couple from Australia), headed back to Ulaanbaatar. The roads were as horrible as ever and along the way we passed “the black market”. […]
Day 8: Ger Life and Rural Monglia part 2
Welcome back to our story of ger life and rural Mongolia. I forgot to mention about dinner on our first night in the ger. What we ate is actually of interest to anyone who has heard our plans and worries about the trip. Food was one of the things Mongolia was not known for in […]
Day 6-7: The Train to Ulaanbaatar
Friday (day 6), after 5 full days in Beijing, we had to get up bright and early to board the first leg of our Trans-Siberian journey. It was actually so surreal to be heading off on this epic cross-continent train journey that we kind of had to keep pinching ourselves to realize that it was […]
Diplomatic practices
This may be putting the cart before the horse, but it seems we now have all of our required visas! Actually that’s a lie, since at the time of posting we’re still waiting on our Chinese visas to be approved. However being someone that occasionally likes to leap before he looks, I wanted to share […]
In which I am glad to be in Canada…
So today was brutally cold here. We have just come off a nice warm spell in our fair neck of the woods, with temperatures hovering around -1ºC to +9ºC. Lots of ice (which sucked) but it was a warm break. This morning I checked my phone weather app and it told me it was 0ºC. […]
Mastercard? Amex? Oh wait… VISA is the name of the game
I know – completely lame, and likely overused title. But seriously – why is there a Visa credit card and a visa travel document? This a life mystery that I fail to understand. Yeah, I should probably go to wikipedia or something, but that takes effort. I somewhat enjoy being perplexed by this issue and […]
Currency Complexities
Beyond a shadow of a doubt I know why the EU was invented now! It isn’t for all of those ‘official’ reasons you’ve heard – it was because they all enjoy vacationing! And nothing complicates a vacation than dealing with many countries, each with their own set of coins and bills. Which brings me to our current situation… Distance […]
First Steps for First Shots
So, if you didn’t know, I’m a nurse. It is of course only natural that the first things I research are vaccines needed for going overseas. Previous travels for both of us have included the EU and Canada/the US. Not the most microbe-prone places on this planet. But going to developing nations, especially where we […]
Rails Across the Curtain 