When I knew that my job was being eliminated last year, I sought out some epic travel ideas that the free time and severance pay would afford me. My road trip across the U.S. in the middle of winter was ambitious, occasionally scary, and ultimately astonishing. If I had stopped there before becoming a productive member of society again, it would have been enough. But another journey I read about captured my imagination and would not let go.
Taking a train from Beijing to St. Petersburg, Russia seemed like an audacious undertaking. I came up with excuses to not do it for months, but I knew I would have regrets if I didn’t seize the unique opportunity to take it. So, on late September day, I found myself boarding the thirteen-hour flight from Chicago to Beijing. Four weeks later, I came home after some of the most remarkable experiences of my life.
My trip reinforced the fact that great travel is more than just checking the next site to see off your list. It’s more learning new things about yourself and the incredible world we live in. Each day on the road (or the rails) taught me something new. I hope my insights help inspire you to plan a great adventure.
Part I: China to Mongolia
Day 1: Overwhelmed and a Taste of Home
While I don’t know what it feels like to be a zombie, I think jet lag is possibly close (minus the overwhelming need to eat brains, of course!). I certainly felt like reality shifted as I wandered around the Beijing neighborhood by my hotel my first night in the city. It wasn’t just that I found myself in a foreign country. It was more like I had landed on another world.
Traveling to Europe, you know you aren’t in Kansas (or Florida!) anymore, but in China, things are so different that it can be jarring. The language is incomprehensible to ears used to English. The alphabet is indecipherable, so you can’t even guess what the words are advertising. I wasn’t meeting my large tour group for a couple of days, so I was by myself feeling very much like a stranger in a strange land. While I am a pretty confident traveler, the jet lag zombification of my brain combined with the sense of being dropped onto a whole new planet had me more than a little overwhelmed.
I ducked into a supermarket and immediately spotted a cooler filled with familiar-looking red cans. Upon further inspection, there was no doubt they contained the sweet nectar of Coca-Cola. The one I bought may have been the best Coke I have ever had the pleasure of drinking. The small taste of home helped bring my zombified brain back into focus. China wasn’t so different after all. And the sugar and caffeine helped me stay awake long enough to start to fight the jet lag.
Coke also needs to step up their can game in the U.S. and give us some cool designs like the one I saw in China too.
Day 2: A Great Wall and a Hot Pot
My soda high had worn off by early the next morning, but I needed to be up to get to my tour heading the Great Wall by 6:30 anyway. Seeing the Great Wall is no doubt a bucket list item, and it did not disappoint. I must have covered several miles of the Wall in the two hours our group was there.
After seeing the Wall, you are in awe of the engineers who designed it. You also feel very sorry for the slaves who built it and the soldiers who manned it. I do think that had I been a Mongol invading from the north, I’d take one look at the Wall, contemplate the arduous slog it would take to get over it, and turn right around for home.
Beyond the Wall, though, I had a great dining experience that night. A few Americans who were on the Great Wall tour and I met up for dinner and went to a hot pot restaurant. Hot pot is kind of like fondue with chopsticks and a slightly better chance of catching yourself on fire. They bring a dangerous-looking contraption to your table that likely would not pass safety standards in the U.S.
The amount of heat the hot pot puts off is intense. I also probably lost more food inside the boiling oil than actually made it to my mouth. That’s likely the reason the mostly Chinese locals in the place had a good laugh at our expense. There’s nothing wrong with that, though. I’m sure we did look more than a little foolish, but my takeaway for the day was that if you aren’t willing to make a bit a fool of yourself, your travel experience will be much less than what it could be.
Day 3: My Private Tour
One thing quickly apparent in China is that the government does what it wants, when it wants, with no explanation. Unfortunately, a decision they made during my time in Beijing was to close the Forbidden City. I was on my own for one more day and had scheduled a walking tour before leaving home. The Forbidden City was the main stop for the day, so I was disappointed they closed it. I decided to go ahead with the tour anyway. This turned out to be a great decision.
The other five people who booked canceled because of the closure, meaning I ended up having a personal guide to take me around for the day. We stopped all over the place and were able to take as much time as we wanted in each. This freedom afforded me the chance to make a fool of myself again by exercising with some of the city’s elderly residents in a beautiful park.
I also had the chance to ride a bicycle around the city, which is like riding through an obstacle course while trying to dodge bumper cars.
Beijing is full of a surprising number of parks. Jingshan Park is in the heart of the city and is anchored by a very large hill that requires hundreds of steps to climb. The work is worth it though because at the top there is a great view of the Forbidden City. Even though I never got to go inside it, I still had an amazing view of the place that I would have not seen had it been opened. I feel sorry for the people who canceled the walking tour just because a major attraction was closed. They missed a really great day. But at the same time, I thank them for my private tour.
Day 4: Too Much Stuff
My Trans-Siberian group tour started today, and we said goodbye to Beijing early in the morning for an overnight train to Mongolia. The views heading out of the city were amazing. This photo shows a nice balance of both the urban and rural landscapes our train passed by.
Something else also became apparent to me that first day on the train: Like others on our tour, I was hauling around way too much in my luggage. Before leaving home, I was pretty pleased with myself for packing only thirty-two pounds worth of stuff. After all, I was spending four weeks on the road. That amount of weight seemed reasonable…until I realized every one of those pounds had to be hauled around for a month. On the bright side, since I wasn’t going to be hitting the gym, at least my suitcase would help give me a workout.
Our tour leader showed us how it could be done. She guided the previous tour from St. Petersburg to Beijing and was heading to Moscow with us. All told, she spent six weeks on the road with the unbelievably small bag in the picture to the left.
I can’t take a weekend trip to visit my sister’s family in Houston with something that tiny. Part of me thinks her suitcase is really one of those pieces of Harry Potter luggage that opens up into a magical storeroom. (Of all the things J.K. Rowling imagined, that’s one I most wish were real.)
Barring some kind of magical invention, I’m still not sure I could manage a month with a bag that small, but the next time I’m on the road for a month, I’m going to aim for something less weighty.
Day 5: The World Really is Flat
The Soviets were a clever bunch. They decided to make their railroad gauges larger than those used by the rest of the world. This difference prevented invading forces from being able to easily use their trains in Russia. (As if the terrible winters weren’t enough!) Since Mongolia was essentially a Soviet puppet state for much of the 20th century, their railroads ended up using the same gauge.
The side effect of this decision is that when traveling from China to Mongolia, trains have to stop for over four hours to change out their bogies (which is a fancy railroad term for the train’s wheels). This procedure is not only long but very noisy. You can get off the train and sit around in a hospital-like waiting room or stay on board with the understanding that the restrooms will be locked. My group opted for the latter.
So, I found myself lying in my bunk after midnight, trying not to think about needing to pee. I decided it was as good a time as any to set my fantasy baseball lineups since games were within a few hours of starting in the States. It didn’t really dawn on me until later how utterly amazing it was that I could be on a train in the Middle of Nowhere, China setting fantasy baseball lineups on my iPad. Thanks to the good people at Gig Sky, I had a super-strong internet connection without needing Wi-Fi.
Fifty years ago, nothing in my story would have been possible since this part of the world was closed off to most Westerners. Twenty years ago, the idea of using any electronics connected to the internet in a remote part of the world was something far-fetched or only for the super-rich. The world has changed, and I very much appreciate it because it helped me win one of my leagues.
The fact the world is connected as never before was driven home later in the day when we arrived in Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. As we exited the train station, a Circle K was near the bottom of the list of things I expected to see. Nevertheless, there it was. Wawa and 7-11 need to step up their globalization game. Circle K is dominating in Mongolia.
One more observation about how the world is now connected: During my time in Mongolia, we also learned that many people still live in gers (the Mongolian word for yurt). One difference from earlier times is that most of them now have satellite TV!
Day 6: Politics is the Same Everywhere
It was a breathtakingly sunny, and my group took a tour in and around Ulaanbaatar. We visited some beautiful memorials. One dedicated to Genghis Khan was a highlight.
I also liked the Zaisan Memorial that was built in the 1960s to celebrate the bond between Soviet Russia and Mongolia. Nobody could do artistic propaganda better than the Communists! It is located on the top of a hill providing a great overlook of the city. The vistas are beautiful, but also offer a sobering view of the pollution problem.
Ulaanbaatar is powered almost exclusively by coal-fired power plants that were not well planned. The wind blows the smoke directly back towards the population center. Things are worse in the winter when residents all burn coal or wood to keep themselves warm in the subzero temperatures. This picture showing the smoke and smog over the city captures how bad it is.
Our local guide talked to us about politics in Mongolia since the fall of the Soviet Union. Power trades hands between the Communists and the Democrats every few years, but the status quo for the average Mongolian stays the same. With over 250 days of sun a year, solar power could be a cure for the pollution and energy problems. Each party makes promises about how they plan to tackle the issue, but nothing ever gets done. Sounds like another country I know…
Day 7: So Much Beauty
Terelj National Part sits a few hours outside of Ulaanbaatar. Thankfully, none of the pollution seems to blow in its direction. The air is crisp and clean, and the park is one of the most stunningly beautiful places I have ever visited. We spent the night at a Ger Camp. I could have spent a week!
The hiking around the camp was terrific. We went on an intermediate level trek for a couple hours, but there were opportunities for people who wanted more leisurely walks or something more challenging. I would have loved a chance to hike to this Buddhist monastery.
As it was, I had to enjoy just being in the mountains on the cusp of fall with the larch trees changing from green to a blazing yellow.
Mongolia is an incredibly diverse country. The southern half of it is dominated by the stark beauty of the Gobi Desert. The northern part of the country almost reminded me of the foothills that lead to the Alps. If you are looking for a unique and active vacation in a stunning setting, put Mongolia on your list. You will not be disappointed.
Day 8: Buddhism and History
On our last day in Mongolia, we toured a vast Buddhist complex. The recent history of Buddhism in Mongolia is unbelievably sad. During the Communist years, somewhere in the neighborhood of 6,000 temples were destroyed. It was part of an effort to eradicate the scourge of religion from the land. Upwards of 20,000 Buddhist lamas were killed as well. Thankfully, some of the sites survived. The complex in Ulaanbaatar is one of the best-preserved, with temples both old and new, small and large.
The Soviets also took priceless relics and converted them into something they thought more practical. A colossal statue of the Buddha stands in one of the larger temples, but it is not the original. Instead, it’s a recreation of an earlier statue that was torn down during World War II, sent to Leningrad, and turned into ammunition.
I am happy to report that Buddhism appears to have made a full recovery in Mongolia. The complex was bustling with activity the day we visited. Our guide noted that many parents were there visiting their children who were in training to become monks. I captured a nice shot of a boy adjusting his robes on his way to the temple. I think they were a little too large for him!
As a history major, I am ashamed to admit that I knew almost nothing about Mongolia’s past. I am very grateful for the chance to have visited this amazing country. One day, I plan to go back.
Later in the day, we were on the train to Russia. My adventure in Siberia was about to begin! You can read about that part of my trip in Part Two of my blog series.
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