Mongolia

KAZAKH  EAGLE HUNTER.

EXPRESS # 3  BEIJING -ULAN BATAAR  MONGOLIA.

  EXPRESS #3   BEIJING -ULAN  BATAAR    MONGOLIA.


 ULAN BATAAR; MONGOLIA.:                               
   Express # 3 was a welcome sight as I was tired and the cabin was excellent. I had a travel companion in my cabin a jovial little Australian Chinese guy.going straight through to Moscow....who proved to be good company for my part of the trip.
This part of the train trip was from Beijing  To Ulan Bataar. After leaving the crowds of Beijing it was once again good to have some peace and quiet and easy to settle in to a relaxing mode. The restarant car on this stage from Beijing to the Mongolian border is Chinese and the food is good, fast, and cheap.This stage was a relatively short trip of just  36 hours and the  journey that was quite comfortable.The Chinese country side is green and everywhere there is noticeably something growing.The scenery tends to get much drier as we head north..with lots of dust and little green vegetation...Looking out of the train window though, at just how cold the surrounding desolate grasslands were I thought that it was quite wonderful that trains don't have flat tyres. We change restaurant cars at the border to Mongolian.Also at the border there is a six hour layover at a wretched early morning hour while the bogeys on the carriages are all changed to a smaller Russian gauge .This is a major operation that they do an all trains entering Soviet Territory.While all this is happening a cold waiting Hall can be utilised also there is a supermarket of such I stock up on some foods and snacks.also some bottles of vodka for bribes. I arrive in U B and are met by the owner of the Hostel that I am staying in who takes me and three other travelers in his van to the hostel,.so that makes it easy. It is very cold... My time here in Ulan Bataar was a week and that was I felt enough time before the Next# 3 Express train from Ulan Bataar to Moscow, .and that was to be some five days of  constant train travel. This is a souvenir card that I chose from my stopover here in Ulan Bataar, to post home.
Posted Ulan Bataar. Posted 20 April 2009.
BEIJING - ULAN BATAAR. 1760 KMS. :TRAVEL TIME 26 HOURS: COST US $260.00 EXPENSIVE.