A Taste of South Korea

One of the many pork barbecues we sampled

Simply delicious. There is no better way to describe the small piece of Korea that we were lucky enough to see, or taste, as the case mainly was. We already knew we loved Korean food from what we had sampled before at restaurants back home, but trying the authentic versions was something else. And, although we did do a lot of eating, it wasn’t just the food that left our mouths watering for more, with the capital Seoul turning out to be one of the cooler cities we have been to and somewhere we would love to spend more time in. We went to Korea, as Seoul is one of the few places that you can fly directly to from Mongolia. This meant we only treated it as a stopover, but looking back we would have loved to have spent longer to check out more of the country. We were only there for four nights and although we did pack a lot in, we were left with a feeling of wanting more.

We arrived at Incheon Airport at about 4am after only a 3 hour flight, so were definitely a bit on the shattered side, with no sleep happening. But at the airport we were met with the efficiency, cleanliness and organisation that is synonymous with Korea. Although it is one massive airport, finding the bus we needed and generally getting out of the place was just so easy. Arriving at our hostel we were met with some of the excellent customer service that we experienced through our entire stay. We weren’t meant to be able to check in to midday, but when we rocked up at 7am there was a note on the door saying the room was ready and to ring a phone number as the staff member was sleeping near the counter. Within minutes we had a full, although rather sleepy, description of the area and its attractions and were in our room and getting a few hours sleep ourselves.

A tasty Spicy Pork Stirfry

From the time we woke up just after midday our Korea eating experience started. Being there for such a short time we wanted to get as much in as we could, so we were definitely a bit on the gluttonous side of things. For this first meal we went to one of the cheap eateries that the hostel had recommended and promptly ordered far too much. For about $8 we got two plates of sushi, a spicy pork stir fry and a wanton soup, plus the other five free side dishes that are common with any Korean meal. The food was excellent and we were left patting our bellies and heading home for another lie down.

Hite – one of a few delicious Korean beers

Well rested, we headed out to drink some Hite, as that is our favourite Korean beer at restaurants back home. We quickly found that Cass is a cheaper and equally tasty equivalent. Jared felt a little “soft” declaring that these are some of his favourite beers in the world, as they are extremely smooth and easy to drink and true beer aficionados would probably say they lack flavour, but they just go down so well. After a few beers we decided we had to frequent one of the many establishments offering fried chicken and beer as their main drawcard. This turned out to be a great idea as we had maybe the best deep fried chicken we have ever had. We chose the boneless pieces, although most locals seemed to go for bones in, and were given a big plate of juicy morsels with an awesome crispy coating.

Crunchy and tasty – deep fried spaghetti

As an aside this place had maybe one of the best bar snacks we have tried also, deep fried spaghetti noodles. They were coated in salt so the crunchy goodness was very moreish.  With a good layering of fried food in us we went out and met some locals and ex-pats in what was a rather lively bar scene for a Thursday evening.

After a few too many samples of the local beers on our night out, a lot of Friday was spent relaxing. We had a food tour booked for that evening so wanted to ensure we were in the best condition for it, as it consisted of a bit of walking to go along with all the eating.

Wrapping a grilled pork morsel in sesame leaf

The tour was great fun. Our host Chuck showed us around four different eating establishments, which meant four different styles of Korean eating. For us the highlight was the first stop where we were able to try a traditional Korean style barbeque. Here we grilled fresh pork side(?) meat over hot charcoals until it got a nice crispy BBQ coating. We then learnt how to correctly wrap each piece in either a sesame or lettuce leaf, along with your own selection of soya bean paste, garlic, shallots, salt, and soy sauce. The end product was a mouthful of absolute deliciousness. The second place had a few traditional Korean dishes. With found the rice cakes a bit on the gluggy side, but the Kimchi pancake we had here was the best example we have had of one of our Korean favourites. The third stop was a restaurant that specialised in a chicken dish from the south of the country. Everyone at the restaurant was just getting big shared bowls of this, which was like an Asian chicken stew. The flavour was tasty enough, although as we were starting to get a little on the full side we didn’t eat too much of this one. On our way to the fourth place we happened upon a shop making string honey sweets. We had seen the guys making these before on TV, so knew they had a very theatrical way of making the fine strings of honey coated in flour. They put on a good show as they sing and count in English and the final product is a tasty and interesting sweet. Click here to check out a quick video we made of their show. The final stop of the tour was a huge food market. We had a bit of a look around, with people everywhere eating any and everything.

Kimchi – anything and everything in the Korean style

One area had people eating raw mince, liver and tripe, which we were glad was not the place we were stopping. Another area had 100s of types of Kimchi with all types of vegetable and seafood pickled in the spicy traditional style. Jared tried a Kimchi crab which you ate shell and all, and although a little on the crunchy side, was quite tasty. The place we stopped to eat at specialised in Mung Bean pancakes which are quite a yummy and wholesome fried treat. We also had pigs ear, blood sausage and lung to snack on here and although Jared did give the sausage a try none were as appealing as the pancakes by a long way. All in all the food tour was a great way to experience Korean cuisine and although it was a little on the pricey side for what you get, the fun of being in a group and having an English speaking guide to ask questions to made it an enjoyable and informative evening.

Mung Bean pancake expert

Looking out towards North Korea with the world’s biggest flag centre of shot

On the Saturday we did one of the few things that didn’t involve filling our bellies, with a tour to the DMZ. This is the DeMilitarized Zone where the Korean peninsula splits between the communist North and the capitalist and flourishing South. The half day tour we did was a bit rushed, but we did get a good feeling for how the South really do want unification (maybe on their terms), while the North is more about protecting what they have (from most reports poverty and propaganda). Some interesting things included the Freedom Bridge which has a lot of messages left by Southern residents for families and friends in the North; the Dorasan Rail Station, which has a closed entry gate for all trains north and is where South Korea hopes it will eventually be able to have trains go through that link it with China, Russia and ultimately Europe;

Standing with the guard blocking the passage to North Korea at the rail station

a lookout point where we were able to see the heavily deforested North Korea, which was due to their fear that if there were trees there this would give people somewhere to sneak through to escape and has now ruined the land; having to stand behind a line to take photos at the lookout, because if we got too close the glare off the camera may be a target, even though there were fixed binoculars to look through that had glass lens and were much closer; and a big North Korean flag that has been part of a tit for tat process with the South as they vie for the world’s biggest flag, although the North Korean’s is based in a fake town that has the shells of houses made to look like a prosperous town, where in all reality there are no people there and there is no way the North would let any of its citizens live that close to the border. Quite an interesting tour, but it didn’t get us much closer to one of the most troubling questions we sometimes ponder: “How would you get the North Koreans, both its leaders and its people, to a position to be able to become part of the global community and not live in the dark, both literally and figuratively, like they currently do?”.

Burger – Itaewon style

With the political side of our stay over it was now time to get back to eating our way through the rest of Seoul for our remaining days. The night of the tour we went out to a busy local barbeque place and had more great grilled pork. There was no English here but we still managed to get some good pieces of pork shoulder (?) that we cooked ourselves, along with a couple of Cass’s to wash it down. The following day we went on a hop on hop off bus tour to take in a few of the sites. Here we stopped in the ex-pat/tourist mecca of Itaewon, where the streets are dominated by foreigners and the shops sell all labels from Nike to Gucci. We decided seen as we were in a foreign area we would try something a bit different so went for the Korean style burger (and also some tasty spicy fried chicken).  The burger had a great sauce on it and the patty was OK, but we have definitely had better burgers on our travels, so decided we should stick to the local specialties. Being our final night we decided we had to give one of the BBQ spots near our hostel a go, so headed out for some more grilled pork which again was absolutely divine.

Some delicious fried chicken for desert to wash down our grilled pork main

The cook-it-yourself pork was definitely our favourite, but this was closely followed by the fried chicken, so we headed back to the same place we had been to on the first night for another plate of the deep-fried goodness and weren’t disappointed second time around. After a couple of Hites to wash it down we waddled back to our hotel thinking we could definitely live in this city, but how do the locals manage to stay so skinny? We would be huge with all this great food on offer at reasonable prices.

Relaxing at a temple in the centre of town

Although we did spend a lot of our time eating, Seoul does have a lot of other cool stuff to check out too. We did manage to walk along the Cheonggyecheon Stream, which goes right through the centre of the city and is quite surreal walking through the picturesque waterways with waterfalls and stepping stones to cross, but with massive skyscrapers towering on either side.  There is also a lot of Palaces that are very tranquil places to check out and we managed to get to one of these as well, which was great to walk around the ancient grounds and check out the old buildings that housed royalty in bygone eras. But overall for us this trip was all about the food and it did not disappoint. It is a big call, as there are so many cuisines that we love, beers we have drunken and cities that we have been to, but after being there for only five days we may just have to put Korea up there as having our favourite food, beer and city of the entire world. Well, that was our feeling upon leaving anyway; maybe we will have to head back sometime soon to confirm it.

Mongolia – Journeys to the Wild Wild East (Part 2)

This is the second part of our blog of our times in Mongolia. For Part 1 click here.

 

Day 6

Searching for dinosaur bones at The Flaming Cliffs

Another relaxing morning as didn’t have to leave the Khongor dunes too early as was not going to be a lot of driving. Fried bread with nutella for breakfast. Mellow drive, stopped at some stalls in the middle of nowhere desert selling rocks and quartz. Had lunch in a small town in a local ger that did dumplings. They were super tasty plus Llama got us a nice cold bottle of coke to go with them. It was the first coke of the journey. Continued on for about 45 minutes driving to the Flaming Cliffs. These big orangey-red cliffs just jutted out of the desert on all angles. Pretty cool landscape to see. Plus this is where in the 1920s they found lots of dinosaur bones, including a couple of full skeletons and the first time in the world that dinosaur eggs were found. Despite his best efforts, Jared only managed to find stones that looked like bones. Although he didn’t try the test that Llama suggested, which was to lick the bone. If it stuck to your tongue it’s bone, if not it’s rock.

We managed to have a shower that night for the first time on the trip. It was only luke warm but still very nice. We stayed in the host family’s ger that night, felt a bit bad kicking them out, especially considering there was a super strong wind that blew all evening and through the night. The family had to stay in the kitchen ger and in cars.

 

Day 7

Inside one of the local family’s ger

Despite the ferocious winds for the entire night we had pretty good sleeps. It was Llama style sushi for breakfast. Rice, cabbage, carrot rolled in seaweed; quite tasty and a bit different. Then we had a short drive to a small village. There was very much nothing going on here and we had to wonder what the people living here must do, both for fun and for work. We had horse meat for lunch, served in a deep fried style pie. It was actually quite tasty, although Tess did have a few issues eating horse. She got through most of it and our bellies didn’t seem to have any negative repercussions.

The grounds around Ongi Monastery – once busy with hundreds of Buddhist monks and their temples

Upon leaving the village it seemed that we are now heading out of the Gobi. Things started to get a bit greener and after a couple of hours, forty minutes or so in the wrong direction, we reached the Ongi River, site of the Ongi monastery. This was the prettiest location we have stayed so far, next to the meandering river with hills all around. It’s definitely a lot colder out of the Gobi and all our winter clothes are starting to come out. We walked for 10 minutes to the Ongi monastery and on the way learnt its sad story from Llama. At one time the complex, which spanned 3 sites and had 30 or so temples, housed up to 1000 monks. It was built in the 17^th century, but was unfortunately destroyed in the 1920s when communism took over in the country. As well as all the buildings and temples being destroyed 200 or so monks were executed, which really makes it a bit of a sad place. They have rebuilt one temple so far and plan to do more. We were able to check out the temple, which was very much like the Tibetan Buddhism style. There was also a Museum ger which had some interesting artifacts that had been found in the area. It would have been an awesome complex in its day and it’s horrible to think that it was man that destroyed it all. And so recently too.

Back at the ger we stayed inside to keep out of the cold wind as best we could and got extra blankets for the night. Llamas beef stew and rice also did good to help us warm up.

Day 8

Eating up the KMs with Agi at the wheel and the snow in the background

An early start for us today, out of the ger camp by 9am. Although, most of the tourists we have come across usually leave by that time or earlier, it is good to have a guide and driver with similar time schedules to us. It was a bit of a long drive today. We got to the town for lunch about 12.30 (beef and capsicum stir fry with rice) and then drove for a few more hours to another town where we stopped for a bit so Agi could procure brake pads for the Land Cruiser. He must have been a rally driver in previous life as he has been powering through the rough terrain all day, overtaking any vehicle we come across with ease. Pretty cool to have such a fast driver, but also a little on the bumpy and scary side at times.

Keeping warm in the ger with Agi and a few vodkas

As we eat up the kilometres out of the Gobi the landscape has changed a lot. The big thing has been more grass, which means more animals, more people, more gers, more roads and more towns. The only thing there has been less of is the heat. It is getting pretty cold and on the way to tonight’s camp we have even seen some snow on the hilltops. We were stoked when we arrived at camp and the first thing the host family did was get a fire going in our ger. We were then happy to get off to see the nearby Orkhon Waterfall, only 10 minutes walk, as we knew we were coming back to some snuggly warmth. The waterfall itself was quite a nice one. Not too high or wide but big enough to be worth a look. Like all things Mongolian there was not much health and safety happening and it was a little disconcerting watching the families go so close to the edge to take photos.

It was great to head back to our ger with the fire cranking. Then to help us warm up more Agi turned up with a bottle of Mongolian vodka. We had a fun evening with him, even though he does not speak much English. We were able to find out he was a childrens doctor (paediatrician, we presume), had a wife and two kids, and had lived in Korea for 5 years, amongst other things. It was a fun night.

 

Day 9

After drinking far too much vodkas the previous night with Agi it was a bit of a slow and ill feeling start to the day. Llama’s fried luncheon and eggs struggled to go down, but at least we had the fire going to get us moving on this cold morning. The fire had gone out during the night and Tess had gotten pretty cold, but they came and re-lit it first thing, so was nice and hot before we even got out of bed.

Soaking in the hot spring pool

The drive for the day wasn’t a long one but was more of what we imagined the majority of Mongolia must look like. Big river valleys with even bigger rolling hills on either side. Picture postcard stuff everywhere you look. Especially when you add in the local farmer’s gers and livestock, as well as lots of majestic eagles flying everywhere. Our stop for the night was the hot springs. The spring itself is about 70 degrees and pipes water to the various tourist ger camps in the area so that they all have their own hot pools. Even though the weather had warmed up a bit (maybe 15 degrees) and the sun was out, it was still nice to soak for a while in what was water about the same temperature as a good bath. It was especially nice considering it was the first proper hot water we had on tour, with the other showers we’ve had being tepid at best. After the soak we had a good shower as well, although Jared had to sneak into the ladies, as the men’s was not hot. Pretty silly considering the ample supply of hot water around the place.

After the soak we took a walk to the spring itself. We ran into a guide taking a big tour who was part Kiwi (although her group were Danish) so was interesting to have a chat to her. We went for a quick walk in the nearby forest and returned to Llama freaking out that we might be lost in the forest. Pretty funny considering we were only gone about an hour, but at least it shows she cares. It was a pretty quiet evening with a nice big fire and Llama staying in the ger with us, as the camp was fully booked out.

 

Day 10

We awoke to a frozen morning, with a solid frost everywhere even on the outside of the ger. Luckily they got the fire started early and inside the ger it was toasty warm. We drove through more of the classic rolling green hills and river valleys, until we came to a larger town. It was super busy with lots of families turning up with slaughtered animals for the butchers and vegetables for the markets, as well as all manner of dairy products, from fresh milk through to dried curd. Llama did some shopping and we had a bit of a look around. From here we drove for about 100kms on a quite nice sealed road. This is the first time we have been on sealed road for more than a few hundred metres since the morning of the first day. The landscape continued on in its awesome nature, as we cruised along the river flat, with big hills on either side, some with a fresh dusting of snow. We stopped at a deep gorged rocky river before going a little further to a small town for lunch of traditional Mongolian noodles and mutton.

Chilling out at the White Lake

From there it was only 30 minutes until we reached the White Lake which is where we are staying for a couple of nights. Apart from the fact our ger is on a bit of a lean, it is an awesome location with the lake sprawling out in front of us. As the day had heated up nicely we spent the afternoon in the sun relaxing, before Llama made another noodle dish for dinner. Once the sun dropped so did the temperature but the fire in our ger was the hottest yet and we were super cozy for the evening.

 

Day 11

These Horses at the White Lake don’t look so scary

We awoke to another fine day. We were meant to be going for horse-riding for four hours to a volcano, however, as we watched them get the horses ready we were put off. The horses kept bolting off and looked very skittish, so we decided horse-riding wasn’t for us, as we were already a little on the apprehensive side of things. Four out of five of a Dutch group staying at the guest camp did go on the horses and as they set off it looked pretty mellow, so maybe we would have been alright. But we were happy to go for a scenic walk around the lake which was nice and relaxing. As the wind dropped it turned out to be quite a warm day we had a great four hour walk and ate sandwiches packed by Llama on a little peninsula on the lake. It was a great spot and good to be off by ourselves for a laidback day.

Traditional Horhog – old school pressure-cooking

When we got back to the camp we chilled out for a bit before Llama came and got us to say it was time to cook the Horhog, a traditional Mongolian meal. It had been described to us as something that sounded similar to a hangi, but it turned out to be more like a pressure cooker. They heated up some rocks in the fire and filled a pot with hot water, along with all the mutton (bones in) and vegetables. They then chucked the hot rocks in and put on the sealed lid. The whole thing was cooked in about 40 minutes, which was well quick considering how much food there was. It was a nice feed too, as the mutton was a lot more tender cooked in this way than what it usually is. It was a pretty early meal which meant an early night’s sleep, with another roaring fire to stave off the cold.

 

Day 12

We think Llama might be running out of options for meals now, as, although she is trying to make us something different every day, today’s breakfast of bread and nutella was definitely on the plain side. Although she did bring some sweet pancakes the local family had made, but overall it was a little sweet for us for a breakfast. We wouldn’t mind double ups if it was like the nice omelettes or French toast we had on the early days.

Agi was back in great driving form today, after he slept most of yesterday, as had had a big night of drinking on our first night at White Lake. We weren’t sure who he was drinking with but he was still worse for wear the following morning and was trying to sell Jared what looked like a dead animal skin. We found out from Llama that this was a Marmot, which is another traditional Mongolian thing, where they cook the meat by putting hot stones inside the gutted animal. Luckily he fell asleep and this didn’t proceed any further later in the day. And now he is back in typically great form and we ate up the KMs, back on the sealed road heading in the direction of Ulaan Bataar. We decided that we were so close that we will head all the way back tomorrow and do one less day of the tour than expected, as there is not much planned for the next day anyway.

Kharkhorum Monastery

Today we stopped at the ancient capital Karakorum. This is the city that the son of Genghis Khan built to give the Mongolian people their first city and capital in the 13^th century. The ancient city does not remain, but there is still one of the holiest monasteries in the country which is nearly as old as the city. We had a good look around the monastery and like what we had seen at Ongi, the Mongolian style of Buddhism definitely takes it roots from the Tibetan style, with very similar artworks and forms of devotion. Although this monastery was closed down during communism it didn’t meet the same level of destruction as Ongi, so there are still a number of buildings in close to their original form.

Traditional Mongolian music on the Horse Fiddle

It was another ger for our last night, although this was more like a hotel ger, with a number of them on a plot of land in the town. There was also a full bathroom complex and a small restaurant area. We found out the daughter of the owners works for Khongor Tours, so it is no wonder they had a lot more of the creature comforts here than in some of the more remote places we have stayed. We had a great evening’s entertainment as a 60-year-old local put on a solo concert for us all. He spoke a bit of English too, so was able to give little introductions to what he was doing as he played various folk songs on traditional instruments like the horse fiddle, the harp and the flute. He also did a couple of songs using traditional Mongolian throat singing, which was both different and enjoyable.

 

Day 13

A very quiet day today, just heading back to UB. Not much on the tourist perspective, apart from another lunch of traditional noodles and mutton. We definitely will be happy to get back to UB and eat some different types of food, as we really are over the chewy mutton that is just oh so common. The drive back was pretty quick, until we hit the outskirts of UB. The capital roads were awful, both rough and packed with cars. It was a slow final few KMs, and we were sad to be finished in the Mongolian wilderness, but it was kinda cool being back in a city too and moving onto the next part of our travels.

More new and old in Ulaan Bataar – Monastery in foreground, high rise in the back

 So that is it for our time in Mongolia. In particular this tour we did with Khongor Guesthouse was one of the best tours we have been on and is a highlight of the 6 months of travelling we have done so far. As mentioned earlier, Mongolia as a country is going through a massive period of change at the moment. Like so many developing countries there is a massive conflict between embracing the change or sticking to the old ways. This is even more evident once you get out of Ulaan Bataar, as the nomad farmers do things so similar to the way they have done it for 100s of years. The mining dollars will be what makes the difference as this starts to trickle down to everyone. It is hard to know if this is happening yet, as those like our guide Llama says she would like to see things remain the same. But the thing is that she wanted to get a cell phone like Tess’s android, to replace her Nokia she already has, and she likes modern fashion also. It is this contradiction that Mongolians are going to have to learn to overcome, as modernisation is inevitable, given the wealth of minerals under their lands and the force of countries like China to desire those minerals. The hope we have is that the wilderness will not be the loser in this process, nor the Mongolian people, as both are beautiful the way they are and it would be awful to see this change too much due to the influences of outsiders. Mongolia is an amazing country so hopefully it will stay that way for future generations.

For a short video about our time in Mongolia click here

Mongolia – Journeys to the Wild Wild East (Part 1)

The Flaming Cliffs – just one of the multitude of amazing landscapes on offer in Mongolia

Mongolia is easily the least developed and most wild country we have ever been to. And we absolutely loved it. It is not wild in a party sense or even a criminal sense; it is wild for its massive amounts of wilderness. The country is huge and a great majority of it is sparsely populated with nomad farmers, so once you get out of the town you feel like you could be back in the time of Genghis Khan and the birth of this nation. Although the Land Cruiser that we were in for our tour, the satellite TV dishes and solar panels most people owned and the modern style dress are all probably a bit different than how it would have been in those days, but not much else seems to have changed. In the cities things are starting to change at a great rate of knots, but in the countryside it is like stepping back in time.

The view of Ulaan Bataar from Unlce Graemes

We were lucky, as we had Tess’s uncle Graeme living in the capital city, Ulaan Bataar, which meant we had somewhere to stay and someone to give us some background information on the country in general. As he holds a senior position in one of the mining companies and has been in Mongolia for a few years he has a nice apartment, a driver and a wealth of knowledge about the place, all of which we were lucky to have access too. We stayed at Graeme’s for a few days on arrival, mainly to get a bit of a recharge after our Trans-Siberian train journey. It was good to be able to have a few home cooked meals and generally just relax while we did some research into what type of tour we wanted to do, as we had heard this was the best way to see Mongolia. We also stayed at Graeme’s upon our return and we were lucky to have Aunty Dorrie there too, so she could catch up on family stuff with Tess, as well as sharing the wealth of knowledge she also has about Mongolia.

The new and old of UB – Uncle Graeme’s apartment building on left, new office complex and an old Russian WW2 tank

UB itself is a pretty crazy city, with more construction and development going on here than maybe anywhere else in the world we have seen. The mining dollar is driving the urbanisation of the country and apartment buildings are shooting up everywhere. Graeme pointed out to us what was the tallest building when he had first come to Mongolia about 5 years ago; there are now maybe 6 or 7 taller than it. The infrastructure, in particular the roads, are struggling to keep up and this is one of the many things the Mongolian government needs to work on to bring their country nearer to the developed world. At times the trip to Graeme’s office, that should take about 10 minutes, can take an hour or more due to the traffic jams. And it is not just the quality of the roads either, the quality of drivers need working on too, with Mongolians taking the cowboy farmer mentality with them to the city, making this maybe one of the more scary cities to drive around, as everyone jostles for position and few give way.

More new and old – Monastery in foreground, high rise in the back

We spent time in the city both before and after the tour that we did. We spent a couple of nights in a hotel in the centre, to get a feel for it, but it didn’t change our opinion too much. It is interesting enough to walk around and check out, with the likes of the State Department Store and Naran Tuul Market (previously the Black Market) both interesting to check out for shopping, although both  supposedly had much better bargains back in the communism days. There are also some communist era statues and buildings and then some of the complete opposite, brand new office blocks and shopping malls. This is one of the biggest things that we took away from Ulaan Bataar and Mongolia as a whole, the difference between old and new. It appears to be a major thing, with some people living in brand new apartments, while others still live in the traditional ger style tent, all within the same city (some right next to each other). With so much money coming in and development cranking, it will be interesting to see how it all plays out over the next 10 years or so.

Breakfast in the Gobi – generally a good feed with Llama’s cooking

For us Mongolia was more about the wilderness and the tour that we were lucky to do to the Gobi Desert and some of central-west Mongolia. As mentioned, a tour had been recommended to us as the best way to see the place and we quickly discovered there were multitudes of options for this. Most guest houses and travel shops have something on offer and there are plenty more choices online. We went around a few places to see what was on offer and were offered everything from just a van and driver, to a luxury style tour where accommodation and food are provided on a five-star level. We decided you probably get what you pay for and went for a mid-range option. For US$95 per day per person we got a vehicle, a driver, a guide and all our meals and accommodation. This was the price for a 2 person tour and if you had more in your group the price comes down, as a lot of that covers the petrol and driver side of things. We came across a few different people doing the “just a van and driver” option and had mixed reports. It sounded like it came down to whether the driver spoke much English or not, with those with a driver they could communicate with enjoying themselves, while those who could not communicate feeling a bit on the isolated side of things.

Agi, our driver, and the Land Cruiser we toured in

Our driver, Agi, couldn’t speak any English, but that didn’t matter too much for us, as we had our guide Llama, who was an English teacher for the majority of the year, so could speak pretty good. She was our cook also and made us breakfast and dinner every day. For lunches we usually stopped at little guesthouses or restaurants. We were lucky that Llama was a pretty good cook and couldn’t complain about most of her meals, although we were getting a bit sick of chewy mutton and noodles by the end of it. But she did try and provide us something different every meal which we appreciated, although, as she started to run low on ideas we wouldn’t have minded repeats opposed to her trying to come up with things she hadn’t made before. The restaurant meals weren’t as good, with a lot of them consisting of the chewy mutton that Mongolians love and we struggled to finish on most occasions. It was alright, but a few herbs and spices wouldn’t have gone a miss, and not waiting to the sheep was as old and tough as possible before butchering might have been good too. Although when we asked Llama if they ever eat lamb, she did say “No! We never eat babies”.

Overall it was a great trip and we were amazed by the awesome landscape every day. For our blog we kept a journal every day as we knew there would be too much to try and remember. We have reproduced this on a day-by-day basis, as we wrote it on the road. The following is all we did in our 13 day Mongolian tour to the Gobi and other cool Mongolian spots

Day 1

Drinking Airag with our guide Llama…mmmm, fermented horse milk

After a brief farewell to Uncle Graeme we were off on our 14 (turned into 13) day tour of Mongolia’s South and West, namely the Gobi Desert and White Lake areas. Quite quickly the roads turned into dirt tracks and we were bumping and grinding our way past sparse pastoral landscapes. An occasional ger dotted the landscape and we saw several herds of horses. Horses are revered here and at our first stop we got to try “airag”, fermented horse milk, in a small family ger in the middle of nowhere. We then walked over to a large herd of 30+ horses to 17 year old farm girl milk them. Quite a site that we were not used to as they used the foals to suck on the teat to get it out, then quickly pushed it away and hand milked it into a bucket. The horse milk has a kinda yogurt taste too it, though is a lot thinner and has a bit more of a tang. It is hard to explain, as it’s quite different to anything we had had before. Supposedly the stuff we had was just right to drink, as had been fermenting a couple of days so was not too old or too fresh. Supposedly often when people try it for the first time they need to go to the toilet, but we were both fine. Llama said she was going to tell Jared not to drink too much, but as he seemed to be enjoying it so much he drank the whole bowl. It is meant to be alcoholic, but you would need a lot to get a buzz as this batch seemed quite weak. It is mainly used in wedding ceremonies where they drink it out of bowls much bigger than the big soup bowls we used. Pretty Crazy stuff.

So many dirt roads to choose from as we cruise through the desert wilderness

Our driver at various points of the trip stopped and asked for directions, which was slightly unnerving considering the remoteness of the area, but we still managed to find our destination, called “Small Rock”.  It had ruins of an old monastery and purported to have good energy, so Mongolians visit here to mediate and place rocks on the piles, which is a traditional Buddhist practice. Llama says we stop so often as they just want to confirm they are going the right way as it is such a massive place. This does make sense, but we had the feeling we got a little lost, considering we didn’t actually manage to stop for lunch on the first day.

We are writing this on this first night from our small tourist family style ger. There is only the one ger for tourists, so we are hoping no other travellers turn up so that we get it to ourselves. There is just a basic longdrop outside, but it does have a western style toilet bowl. Our bellies are nice and full with a simple meal of noodles and we are about to head off for a sunset walk.

First night ger camp – loving the isolation

We saw a small snake when we headed off for the walk. More of a surprise than something to be scared of, but it did make us wonder if there are many more around. Llama says not many snakes in Mongolia are poisonous. Our query is: how do they survive in the -40 temperatures that hit in winter. After the walk we had some good talks to Llama and started to build up the impression that things are done quite different here than what we are used to. First some shamans turned up to ask directions to a holy place, so one of the hosts went with them to show them. They came back and dropped him off, as they had to find two more holy places before they could start their ceremony and communicate with the dead. Definitely an interesting type of a religion (?). Llama also told us of some strange Mongolian superstitions. “You can’t call a horse by its actual colour” black horses are known as green.  “If you have a single male baby then it must be called a girl and raised as a girl” All things that must be so that the gods/bad spirits don’t know what you are talking about (?)

Day 2

We had the ger to ourselves so got an excellent night’s sleep. With part of the roof left open it was pretty cool to be able to see the stars. It was also pretty cool literally, almost cold, although we did have plenty of blankets so wasn’t too much of a worry. Llama cooked a nice breakfast for us, omelette, tomatoes and bread with nutella.

Pretty rough roads = flat tyre

The first stop was at a capital town of one of the districts. All the provinces are set up like this from the communist days, with an administrative capital town for every district. This particular town came as a surprise to us, as we drove through the usual vast planes, came over a hill, and suddenly a town appeared from nowhere. We ended up stopping here for a while as we discovered we had a puncture when filing up our diesel, so Agi our driver had to get that mended. While he was doing that we went for a walk through the sleepy town (supposedly extra quiet on a Sunday). It was interesting to see a few random statues of local politicians and wrestlers who had made it big. Tess found some sunglasses that costed less than $2, so that was a good score. We then had lunch at a local restaurant that consisted of mutton, rice and eggs. Wasn’t too bad, but the mutton was a bit on the chewy side. When we continued driving we started to head towards a big storm. Typical that it rains when we are in the desert. We ended up following another SUV (although not 4×4) that got stuck in the sand ahead of us. After a couple of attempts, with the tow rope snapping, we managed to push it out, luckily just before a huge downpour hit.

The White Stupa – so many awesome colours

We continued on with the same feeling of the previous day that maybe we did not know where we were going. This turned out to be even more accurate than yesterday as we drove past some big red cliffs and ended up driving up on top of them, and onto a big plane that did not have a track to follow. We were trying to find the White Stupa, but turns out this was the Red Stupa we had stumbled upon. After finding some local farmers and after doing a big circle past the red cliffs again we were back on track. Another hour or so of driving and we made it to the White Stupa. It was a pretty cool set of cliffs with multiple coloured layers and crazy sand dunes below; red, purple orange and white. Almost a 2D effect similar to a painting. We stayed at a nearby tourist ger camp for the night. Llama made a good chunky soup for dinner, quite nice as was getting a bit chilly. We had a few vodkas and relaxed to some tunes in the middle of nowhere desert landscape.

Day 3

Another good night’s sleep. Breakfast, like dinner, was eaten on a table outside of our ger. Great view for a meal, this time so good French toast. We then drove to a large local town, Dalanzalgad. We were meant to have a hot shower here, but it was not available. We haven’t had a shower yet and are not sure when we will get one.

On the rough dirt/gravel roads/tracks Agi’s driving is a mixture of four-wheel driving and rallying. We are getting used to the bumpiness, but still get shaken around a bit. We only stopped and confirmed directions a couple of times, before making it to the museum we were stopping at. There were some interesting stuffed animals here and most impressive were the dinosaur bones and eggs.

Sadly we didn’t get to see this stream frozen

We then drove up a big valley, and then walked even further following a stream. It was quite an impressive valley with big rocky mountains on either side. Usually there is ice here most of the year with the river frozen over, but we had missed earlier in the month.

We then drove for a few more KMs out of the valley and stayed at a campsite with little cabins (and, strangely, lots of exercise equipment). It was a different landscape again to the other nights, with big ranges and all directions. We had a nice dinner of spaghetti, watched a sunset and then watched a movie on our tablet. Good relaxing evening.

Day 4

The gers we stayed at with the Khongor Dunes in he background

It was a pretty quiet day, driving to the Khongor Sand Dunes. Like every day there were more awesome views with big ranges on either side, as the land around us got more sandy and arid the further we went. We stopped for a pre-cooked lunch with the sand dunes behind us a backdrop. We arrived at the family ger where we are staying for 2 nights and just had a relaxing afternoon doing not much. Just looking over the awesome dunes behind us. It was a pretty hot afternoon too, 30 degrees plus and a warm breeze. Another nice sunset and an early night in preparation for the camel trek tomorrow.

Day 5

Camel trekking in the Khongor Dunes

The magnificent Khongor sand dunes were our backdrop for this entire day, as we were staying put at the family ger for a second night. This meant a bit of a sleep in, a late breakfast (cheese toasties) and a lazy/relaxing morning. We then went for a camel trek into the dunes. It was pretty cool, as was just us two and a guide, who was the farmer lady/mother from the gers where we were staying. We just went along in a caravan procession so did not have to worry too much about steering. Although Tess was on the middle camel, so had to hold the rope for Jared’s, which meant she had to stop it every time it tried to take off. On the dirt and grass the camel ride was a little on the bumpy side, but once we got onto the sand things got a bit smoother. We stopped for lunch on the sand dunes, with the camels sitting around us to act as a barrier against the wind. They did a pretty good job, but still couldn’t help a little bit of sand getting into or tuna and egg salad. We did a little climb to one of the nearby dune peaks, which was pretty tiring considering we didn’t get up too high. But the views were still spectacular, with the sandy landscape around us something completely different. The trek back to the camp was pretty relaxing as we had gotten used to sitting on the camels. But we could have gone out for another trek later that afternoon and decided that the three hors we had done was plenty. This was justified by our stretched/sore muscles later in the day.

The rest of the afternoon was a relaxing one. Mike the Canadian was staying at the same ger camp and he was good value to talk to, as was getting to the end of his 24 day Mongolian trek. There was another awesome sunset and equally good dinner from Llama (pancake with a tuna filling) and then that was it for a relaxing day with one of the coolest backdrops on earth.

Sunset over the Khongor Dunes

The weather in the Gobi desert is intense. It is super-hot during the day, but there can be ferocious winds, usually in the evenings it seems. These create some massive dust storms and can be so strong you struggle to stand up. We have also had showers of rain and some sudden cold snaps. And we are here between summer and autumn, which is meant to be one of the more pleasant times of the year here in the desert. We can only imagine what it would be like in the severe heat of summer or the even more severe freezing -30 degree temperatures in winter.

For a short video about our time in Mongolia click here

For Part 2 of our Mongolian Blog click HERE

Trans-Siberian Madness Part 2 – Omsk to Mongolia

For Part One of our Trans Siberian Journey click HERE

13/08/12 – 10.30 (Day 6, 19 hours into second leg)

Life in the cabin without air-con was pretty warm 

Well we have already been on the second train for a night. There is not the access to power supply as there was on our first train, so we only brought the laptop out for the first time now. One thing we forgot to mention when we were leaving Omsk was how damned hot Siberia can be, with the temperature at the station showing 36c when we left there. This was compounded by the fact our second train does not have air-conditioning. At the time of booking we probably thought something like “hey, we will be in Siberia, how hot can it be?”. How wrong we were. Luckily from the time we hopped on at 15.25, until about 23.30 we had our cabin to ourselves, so were able to make the most of the limited cool air coming through the tiny open window. Luckily the temp dropped into the evening and by the time our cabin-mates hopped on it was relatively pleasant. The 50 or so year old Russian couple that hopped on are extremely nice. Tess was already asleep, but Jared was still reading, so they offered some chocolate and whiskey that it would have been rude not to accept. There were still some massive communication problems, so apart from names, the fact their children can speak English well and that they are going to a destination further than ours, there wasn’t much talked about. But the chocolate and whiskey was well enjoyed. Despite the lack of air-con it was still a good night’s sleep and we have only recently hopped up for breakfast. Nearly half way through this leg and again the time seems to be flying by.

13/08/12 – 21.30 (Day 6, 28 hours into second leg)

Siberian Villages – must be pretty chilly in the winter

Another day on a train is nearly done. We have gone forward another time zone and have one more to go through before arriving in Irkutsk, which will make a jump of 5 hours now since Moscow. The scenery on this part of the Trans-Siberian has been much more to look at than the first part out of Moscow. In particular the first day from the Russian capital had no sign of life and was pretty much all forests of spindly pine and another white barked tree. We even started playing a game called “Bird”, where we got a point for every bird we saw or 3 for a flock. By the time we arrived in Omsk the score was 6-3. Which says more for the lack of nature than the amount of time spent staring out the window. Getting nearer to Omsk there was a few more wooden home villages and the odd city, but since leaving Omsk there has been plenty more to see in this part of Siberia. The small wooden homes that seem to be the norm here must be hell in winter, but I guess it means there isn’t a lot to heat. They are so different though to the massive brick and concrete constructions that are so prevalent through Eastern Europe. These places are something more similar to New Zealand, all with a bit of land around them filled with gardens of vegetables and sunflowers. It is so hard to imagine the area being in sub-zero temperatures for such a long part of the year. As well as the villages the landscape has become more varied as well. There are open fields (most of which not planted in crops), forests of varying trees, rivers, ravines and mountains (well hills anyway), that all make for an interesting view. With the laptop running low on battery it is unlikely we will make another entry on this journey, but again it has gone by so quick it is quite crazy. I guess it all comes down to expectations. If you expect something to take a long time, it doesn’t seem to bother you. Our train journey that felt the longest has been one that was meant to take 8 hours and took over 12. Now that seemed to go on forever. These 40 hour trips are nothing…if they only take the expected 40 hours.

Irkutsk and Lake Baikal (Listvyanka) – 14/08/12 to 20/08/12 (Days 7 to 13, Beginning of third leg)

Wooden Houses in Irkutsk – falling to pieces, but would have been special in their day

We arrived in Irkutsk early morning as expected and the weather had changed so much since leaving Omsk a couple of days ago. Now we have more understanding how Siberia can be so cold in the winter. Compared to the 36 degrees when we left Omsk it was 12 degrees when we arrived in Irkutsk, grey skies and showers. Not pleasant at all. Sadly this weather stayed with us for our entire time here and at Lake Baikal, although at least at last we felt vindicated for carrying around warm clothes for the past 4 months because now there was plenty of need for them. We spent one night in Irkutsk on arrival and another before we left again. The middle 4 nights were spent in Listvyanka, on the shores of Lake Baikal. Irkutsk was an interesting enough town and we enjoyed walking the streets and seeing Siberian city life in action. They had a huge market there which if we had of spent more time would have been great for self catering. The other interesting thing was all the old wooden houses. They were all sadly in a bad state of repair, but must have been grand in their day. We really didn’t do too much here though, with the weather being a major deterrent.

Lake Baikal – a beautiful spot, but pretty cold and a little on the quiet side when we were there

At Lake Baikalthe weather was equally bad, so we didn’t do much there either, although there didn’t seem to be much to do. Tess was also still recovering from her upset tummy, so the four nights of relaxation were probably a good thing for us. We did make it out on a lake trip one day and it would be a fun lake if the weather was nicer. Either warmer or colder. In the middle of winter it freezes over and can be skated or driven on. It would be amazing sight to see, as is one of the biggest fresh water lakes in the world and is also the deepest lake. We were expecting more tourist activity, but apart from stalls selling jewellery made from the local gem stones and others selling smoked fish, which is by far the local food specialty, there wasn’t much else.

Smoked Fish stalls at Lake Baikal all selling the local speciality of Omul

Food-wise our general feeling of Russian cuisine being some of the worst in the world continued here with some very average restaurant meals. We were spoilt, however, as Olga’s Guesthouse where we stayed had a great cook. Namely, Olga. We had breakfast every day there and decided it wasn’t worth risking the restaurants and ended up having a couple of dinners there too. Her meals were always big and delicious and she would be a little offended when someone didn’t leave their plate clean. This meant Jared got extra servings at most meals, firstly from Tess, but then when some Australian ladies arrived also, as they did not want to risk the tut-tutting of Olga at an unfinished meal. This was probably the highlight of Lake Baikal for us, although it is quite a beautiful place and maybe in better circumstances (weather and health) we would have found more to entertain us and get us out to enjoy the natural beauty like we had expected when committing to four nights here. It was still great for more recharging of the batteries before our last Trans-Siberian leg into Mongolia.

21/08/12 – 17.30 (Day 14, 20 hours into third leg)

Our lone carriage waiting at the Russian Border

Our Russian train journey and general travel through Russia is nearly over. We are sitting at the border with Mongolia waiting for all the paperwork to be completed and the train to continue. They allow 5 hours for this border crossing and it appears that they plan to take every minute of it. Then we have another 3 hours when we arrive in Mongolia to get those formalities out of the way. All on the time plan though, so it is expected, but that still hasn’t allowed for a great deal of confusion with all the tourists in similar positions to ourselves, wondering what happened when we arrived here 4 hours ago and were told that passport control would be in 4 ½ hours, or maybe that was 4.30pm, none of us could work it out.

But that has been the beauty of our most recent Russian train on the Trans-Mongolian. The rest of our carriage is all travellers like us, so we have had heaps of people to talk to who are all in the same boat as us. Hopping on the train was crazy, with everyone speaking English. One guy even commented “at last they have put all the backpackers together this time”. But we think it is more that it is only the travellers who take the train into Mongolia, most Russians don’t holiday here. It has made for a completely different train experience, with lots of people to talk to. Even the Chinese mother and daughter that are in our cabin speak good English. So far we have chatted to Irish, Australian, Dutch, Portugese, French and Chinese and I am sure there are plenty of other nationalities on this train. All sharing their experiences of their crazy times travelling through Russia.

Heading out of Russian the scenery kept getting better and better

Scenery-wise this leg of our trip has been awesome also. We left Irkutsk in darkness, but ever since it got light the landscape has been brilliant. There has been so much water, with rivers and lakes everywhere. Plus there is plenty of green farmland with mountains as their backdrop. We have seen a lot of farmers in the fields and everywhere seems to be alive, despite the isolation that is abundant in what is one of the quieter areas of the world. There are parts that really remind us of New Zealand, with all the green and variation in landscape so similar.

It will be interesting to see if much changes once this border crossing is finally over and we hit Mongolia. We have heard only good things about the Mongolian countryside and it seems that these good things have already started a few 100kms from the border.

Ulaan Bataar, Mongolia – 22/08/12 – 7.00 (Day 15, third leg complete)

Well we made it. The dread of the long trips, no showers and lack of sleep proving to be much less painful than expected. The last leg in particular was a breeze, as we knew what to expect and, as mentioned, the addition of plenty of fellow English speaking tourists made this the easiest part of the journey. The border crossing on the Mongolian side was almost as confused and time-consuming as the Russian, but again it had been planned in the timetable so we were kind of expecting it. Although there was even less to do in the small Mongolian border town than the Russian one, so our entire carriage just sat and waited for the couple of hours to pass until it was time to hop back on and have our passports stamped. By the time we left it was dark and it was a bit of a pity not to be able to see the North Mongolian landscape as we entered into the country. Once the sun had risen this morning we were getting pretty close to our final destination, the capital Ulaan Bataar, but we could see even then that the landscape here was something else. With plenty of water and grasslands around and the traditional Mongolian Gers dotting the landscape, we really felt like we had entered into a different world from Russia. And there was a sense of relief at this. It is hard to be too critical as our experience of the massive country is only a short one and was mixed with weather and health issues, but we left with a feeling that we were in no hurry to return. This is strange for us, as we have pretty much loved every other country we have been in. Again, maybe it was just us, but the coldness of the people, the poor quality of food and the general high prices of everything really did put us off. Now we are in Mongolia and are really excited to check out this new country that we know so little about. Things have already started so well for us here, with Tess’s uncle Graeme having his driver pick us up at the train station and whisk us back to his comfortable and modern apartment. We can’t wait to have a shower, wash the Russian dirt off us and start a new leg of our trip. In saying that, the Trans-Siberian was a very interesting experience and we are definitely glad we did it , we just probably wouldn’t do it again.

Trans-Siberian Madness Part 1 – Moscow to Omsk

08/08/12 – 13.15 (Day 1, 0 hours into first leg)

Here comes the train – Moscow Station

OK. So for this Trans-Siberian blog we are going to try and write it as we go to get a true feeling for this epic journey. Although we have already done a couple of overnight Russian trains to get this far, one from Riga (Latvia) to Saint Petersburg and one from St P to Moscow, this is really the start of the journey for us today. Right here, right now. We are sitting on the train waiting for it to leave in a couple of minutes. Our route is Moscow to Omsk and is expected to take 42 hours. Yep, 42 hours. All in the same carriage with nothing more than a few 20-30 minute stops at a couple of the larger stations along the way. Well that is what we have heard anyway. By the time we arrive in Mongoloia in two weeks time we will have done three train journeys, each in the 40 hour region, and stopped at a couple of cities along the way to recharge our batteries. On this leg alone we will go through 3 time zones. Also just to clarify, we are actually doing the Trans-Mongolian, as it goes through Mongolia, but as it follows the majority of the Trans-Siberian line and that is the one everyone knows we are calling this the Trans-Siberian Blog.

Basic Food Supplies – apart from instant noodles there wont be much cooked food on this jounrey

Tess is already into our food supplies and we haven’t even left the station yet. It will be interesting to see how long it lasts. We bought a few things from the supermarket yesterday. Mainly dried food, chips, crackers, etc. Plus some bananas and apples. And also some 2 minute noodles, though not sure if we will get boiled water. There is a restaurant cart, but that is meant to be expensive, so the tip is to buy from the vendors at the stations. Given our lack of Russian that might be fun, but we will see how it goes. Either way I don’t think we will go hungry.

And we are off. The train is slowly chugging out of Kazanskiy Station, Moscow. We were meant to leave at 13.20 and it is now 13.32. This is going to be one crazy journey. Will be interesting to see how fast this thing goes and how many stops we make.

08/08/12 – 22.00 (Day 1, 9 hours into first leg)

Borscht and Beers – our only restaurant cart meal

Only nine hours in. No worries so far. We have done plenty of journeys this length or more in our travels, so with the distance expectation so much greater it has been an absolute walk in the park to this stage. We just got back from the restaurant cart, which pretty much went as expected. There was no English menu and the attendant lady spoke no English either. With a basic translation from a guy sitting near us we ordered the Russian soup staple, Borscht. We managed to work out which ones the beers were so we got a couple of those too. We were thinking we would eat more than soup, but it was hearty enough and we didn’t risk the “point at the menu and hope” option, that we had decided would be our last resort if we couldn’t read the menu. We definitely aint going to be going hungry, but we might eat a lot of beetroot soup, which we don’t mind at all.

So for the journey has actually seemed super quick. Jared has spent the majority of time on the laptop, catching up on photos and blogs that we want to get together from our previous couple of weeks. Plus he has managed a few TV episodes. Tess has her double book combo going. She has lots loaded onto the phone to read and if that runs out she has one thick Steven King number to get her through. We don’t have a power outlet in our cabin, but there is one just outside the door. We were able to set up our adaptor, with the multi-plug and then both the phone and laptop charger earlier, so we both have fully charged devices to get us to sleep. Hopefully we will be able to use these to keep powered up for the duration.

In terms of the cabin, we are in a 4 berth second class sleeper, which is what we have booked for the entire journey. We have air-con, which is a necessity we have found, after we went to restaurant cart and saw that the thermometer there was still sitting around the 30 degree mark (we hope the rest of our trains have AC, but aren’t so sure as it doesn’t say it on the tickets). Our two cabin-mates are a couple of old Russian guys who have pretty much slept the entire journey so far. Our guess is that they will be hopping off somewhere during the night and are trying to get a good sleep in till then. We had heard the Trans-Siberian was known for its party train atmosphere and vodka drinking but we haven’t seen none of that yet. Maybe in third class? Time for a bit of reading and laptop TV before bed.

09/08/12 – 11.30 (Day 2, 22 hours into first leg)

First night’s sleep wasn’t too bad for a train. Jared on the top level and Tess on the bottom. Air-con was a little on the chilly side, but definitely better that way than being too hot. Tess could hear someone in the next cabin snoring, but apart from that there was little interruption. The train is a bit bumpy so you do get woken up a bit but no more than you would expect in such a situation. Time has jumped forward a couple of hours, so when Jared thought he had slept in to 10.30, it was only 8.30 Moscow time, but guess we got to adjust to the right time anyway. Maybe that’s what the old fellas in our cabin are doing who went to bed so early and didn’t get off during the night.

09/08/12 – 16.30 (Day 2, 27 hours into first leg)

Random food options on the platform

Just had our second substantial stop at a station, maybe about 15 minutes. There are people selling things on the platform, but not the array of food we had expected. When we stopped yesterday people were selling more random stuff, goblet sets, stuffed animals, vases, chandeliers, jewellery, but today there was at least some more food. All pretty basic though: packet noodles, ice creams, drinks, etc. One lady was selling cooked chicken and potatoes, but as it was about 35 degrees outside and it didn’t seem to be refrigerated we decided to give it a miss. Hopefully we will have another stop nearer to dinner time as we could eat something locally produced (that isn’t out of a packet). Beers were a lot cheaper on the platform than the train, so Jared picked up a couple of these (about $2 each compared to $4 on the train).

Stuffed animals and cuddly toys on the platform – just what you need for a Trans-Siberian train journey

Omsk – 10/08/12 to 12/08/12 (Day 3, 4 & 5, Beginning of Leg 2)

Well the last part of the train journey was over so quick there was hardly time to add to the blog. Although we arrived in Omsk at 9.25 local time it was only 6.25am Moscow time, which was more where our body clocks still were, so we pretty much had just gone to sleep and woken up and we were there. One of our elderly male cabin companions exited during the evening, so it made it even quieter for our last night’s sleep. We pretty much finished off all our noodles (there was free boiling water, luckily) and other items so have decided we estimated the food requirements quite nicely.

Sunset in Omsk – a surprisingly nice Siberian city

We had arranged for the hotel to have someone pick us up at the train station, so it was all too easy when there was a lady standing outside the train carriage with a sign with our name on it. We were whisked through the station and at our hotel in no time. We were even lucky to be able to check in before 10am, which is a rare occurrence. We definitely felt a little wiped out, but didn’t need to go straight to sleep, so headed out to get some breakfast/lunch. We were pleasantly surprised by the number of eating options and the modern Siberian city of Omsk, which is a little more Asian feeling compared to the Western Russian cities. After a relaxing afternoon spent in the hotel room, we headed to the local river/beachfront marquee style restaurants, just outside the front of our hotel. Although these had some nice smelling BBQs going we struggled to be able to order much here and had a dinner that consisted of one pork shish kebab, a packet of crisps and some beers. The cool thing was the setting, right on the river with plenty of activity on it and a great sunset. The next day Tess was a bit ill, so maybe it was a good thing we hadn’t eaten more at the restaurant. Though we are not sure what caused it, as could have been something on the train, the water, either meal we ate in Omsk, the terrible breakfast at our hotel or something else. Whatever it was it meant we ended up having a very low key day, only making it out in the evening to stock up on supplies for our next train journey and some dinner. After a couple of quiet days we were well recharged for our next train journey, so after  breakfast and a hair-raising 90km/hr taxi ride through the city streets, here we are waiting for our next 40 hour train, deeper into Siberia to Irkutsk.

For Part 2 of our Trans-Siberian Journey click HERE

St Petersburg and Moscow – The start of our Russian adventures

As everyone knows Russia is one massive country, which means there is a lot to see and therefore a lot to write about.  The Russian section of our travel was something we had planned and looked forward to before we had even left Australia, as we had to organise our visa and train travel for specific dates. This meant we had plenty of time to think about it, and get worried about all the evils of big bad Russia. In the end some of the things we worried most about, dodgy people, crime and getting lost, didn’t prove to be an issue. But some of the other things we hadn’t considered did make the country one of our least favourite on our journey so far. In particular the quality and price of food and accommodation left a lot to be desired, plus we found it hard to meet people, as they all seemed rather closed. Although this last point maybe due more to a communication problem, as English is not big here compared to any other country we have travelled. These issues weren’t quite as bad in Moscow and St Petersburg, which is what we will concentrate on for the first part of the Russia blog, but they did start to rear their ugly head.

Rastafarians, a Republic, Beaver Stew, Hitler, Stalin and the Beach – Only in Lithuania and Latvia

Vilnius Old Town

Well Latvia and Lithuania aye. Of all the countries we have travelled to, these have to be two that we least expected we would ever get to. In fact, before we started looking into doing this trip if you had of asked us to point to either of these on the map the best we could have done would have been “somewhere near Russia”. And Russia has definitely played a big part in the recent history of these Baltic nations (including Estonia, which we sadly didn’t make it to). With borders on the Baltic Sea these countries have always been sought after. Before the Russians wanted a part of them it was the Swedes trying to get at them to take their powerbase onto mainland Europe. Lots of interesting history and culture in general, which means it was a real pity we only had four days left when we entered this region until we were booked to arrive in Russia. If we had to plan things again, maybe we would have allowed more time to explore these Baltic nations. Although saying that, as cool as they are, they are not as cheap as you would expect, with their ascension to the Euro pushing prices up to close to what we were paying in Germany and pretty much more than the rest of Eastern Europe; in the tourist areas anyway. Although, that shouldn’t put you off exploring what is definitely some different countries

mmmmm….Beaver Stew

We arrived in Vilnius, Lithuania’s capital, after a 10 hour train trip that included 2 changes, so were a little on the tired side. But as we only had two days here, we headed out to find some local cuisine for dinner. We definitely found something different, with the restaurant we ended up at having plenty of local game specialties, which included Beaver Stew. In a country we had not expected to go to, we ate some meat we did not expect to eat and it was awesome; tender, juicy and very flavoursome. After such a great meal we decided to head out for a drink. The first pub we went to was modelled on an English theme, with a red phone-box as the entry to the bar area and pint glasses that were actually even bigger than pints. They even had some pretty classic meals on their menu, including fish and chips (which looked awesome) and a full English breakfast, but unfortunately when we went back the next morning to try them we found out it didn’t open to the evening. On our way home that first night we stopped off at another bar and were pleasantly surprised to find them playing a documentary on Jamaican dancehall music. The place was filled with dread-locked Lithuanians, which was quite surreal. We had stumbled upon the local wannabe-Rasta scene. After the documentary finished a DJ started and there were some pretty interesting reggae dance moves going down. The crowd was a little strange in our opinion, maybe summed up nicely when Jared asked one guy where he was from and his answer was “earth”. Maybe a little try hard, but great to see something quite different.

Vilnius Cathedral is one of the many cool old buildings in the Old Town

On our one full day in Vilnius we tried to get in as much touristy things as we could. There is a great Old City area which we walked around including a number of churches you can see inside for free. There is a couple of hills you can walk up too, so we were able to get some great views of the city and the multiple spires that rise from it. We also had to check out Uzupio, which is suburb that has declared itself its own republic, with its own constitution, and on April 1 it celebrates its National Day. This is where all the artists and general Bohemians live so was interesting to check out, but there were also plenty of trendy locals from the other side of the river here, which makes us think that like so many of the “cool” places in the world the usual gentrification is starting to happen here also.

St Peter’s Cathedral in Riga Old Town

Without any good train connections between Vilnius and the Latvian capital of Riga, we decided to go by bus. We chose what was called the luxury option, which wasn’t much pricier than the standard, and were stoked with the quality. The five hour trip flew by, with a generous amount of leg room, WIFI and a personal media player screen on every seat to watch English movies or play games on. In Riga we were met by the owner of the apartment we rented in his little convertible Fiat, which he was extremely proud of and was pretty cool. The apartment was across the river and outside the Old Town area, but was only a short walk away. We headed in for some dinner and found, maybe more so than most places, the main old town tourist area extremely expensive for food and drink. It was however quite visually stunning, but it is hard to imagine too many locals spending time there.

Jurmala Beach on a 30+ degree day

The constant theme we have had through Eastern Europe of temperatures being far higher than expected continued in Riga. With it being over 30 degrees we decided to do what the locals do on our only full day here and headed out to Jurmala Beach. It was the first time in a couple of months we had the chance to go to a beach that was on the sea (not a lake) and we were surprised by its quality. The long white sandy beach however was totally packed out, and I guess who can blame the locals, as you would have to make the most of a 30 degree weekend day, when such a large percentage of the year the temperature is below 0. Jared went for a dip in the Baltic Sea and, despite how warm the air temp was, the water didn’t match and was extremely chilly. It also had a far less salty content than any sea he had swam in before and had a green algae/plant growing. But hey, there were plenty of locals swimming and it was bloody refreshing.

Hitler and Stalin at Riga’s Museum of Occupation. Definitely two of the least liked people in these parts

As our overnight train to Russia didn’t leave to 6pm on our last day in Riga, we had plenty of time to get out and see some tourist sites. We started with a free walking tour, which surprised us a little, as it didn’t go through the Old Town. The guide was rather flamboyant, so it made for an enjoyable experience and we got a bit a feel for the history of the place, which included some early occupation by the Swedes, followed by some pretty sad times when Russia had control of the place. There is still a big Russian influence in the city at the moment, with up to half the population coming from there. It is a matter of contention with the locals, as they bring in a lot of wealth, but they also feel they are still being occupied by the former communist behemoth. After the walking tour we checked out the Museum of Occupation, and from here you can really see why the Latvians aren’t too keen on being occupied. After WW1 they only had independence for 20 years, until Stalin and Hitler did a deal that saw Russia occupy Latvia. This lasted until 1941 when the Nazis invaded Russia and took Latvia for their own. At this stage the Latvians welcomed the Germans as they were seen as their liberators, how wrong they were. Then by the end of WW2, Latvia was back in the hands of the USSR and they had to suffer under communist tyranny right up to their independence in 1992. During these occupations over 550,000 Latvians disappeared, which is over one third of the population pre WW2.

Despite all the doom and gloom of these occupations, which affected both Latvia and Lithuania, both countries seem to have come through it well. Vilnius and Riga are both great old cities that are some of the tourist hot spots in Europe and, from what we have read, both countries have great things to see outside their capitals. We are a little disappointed we didn’t get to see more of them, but from the little taste we got, it tasted pretty good.

Poland – Past, Present and Prospering

Krakow Old Town Square with the Cloth Market and ClockTower

Poland just might be one of the most fucked over countries in the world in recent centuries. Being wedged between Germany and Russia has not made for a nice place to be when it comes to nationalism or independence. But that hasn’t stopped the Poles from being one of the more fun and easy going cultures we have come across. On top of that their country, or at least the main cities we went to, has some of the best tourist sights we have seen. Although some of them are a little on the sombre side, given the recent occupations of Russian Communists and German Nazis.

St Mary’s Cathedral on the corners for Krakow Town Square

We started Poland in Krakow, which is one of the “it” cities in terms of European tourism. There is little wonder why when you arrive to the huge Old Town square, lined with great architecture, big churches and clock-towers, with the iconic Cloth Market in the centre. On top of all there is to see in the city area there are also some world-class day excursions to be had to the likes of Auschwitz or Wieliczka Salt Mines, both very different types of tourist experiences but both well worth a look. And if all the sights aren’t enough there is also the nightlife, which Krakow is renowned for, with pubs and clubs hiding down every alleyway and courtyard behind the old building facades.

As the train we caught from Berlin ended up being about 5 hours late due to electrical faults we arrived in the city after midnight. The Old Town was pumping, with as many people out and about as we saw any other time of the day. We were a bit on the tired side after the train so took it easy for this night, but we did make it out later to see some nightlife. On this occasion we decided to check out the Jazz Rock Club. This basement style bar turned out to be more of a metal rock club, with a death metal band, complete with Polish operatic style singing, playing when we first arrived. They were great fun and the small crowd was really getting into it for a Sunday night. After the band finished the DJ continued playing great tunes that kept us happy for too many hours at the bar.

One of the many engravings and sculptures in the salt mines

The first tourist thing we did was check out the Wieliczka Salt Mines, as being the weekend we thought it might be a good idea to get the 15km out of the city. This wasn’t the smartest move with the place absolutely packed with local tourists. Lucky for us they did separate English tours so we were able to jump the 100m long queue to get in on one of these. We weren’t sure exactly what to expect here and when we started our descent down 50 something flights of stairs, to end up over 130m underground, we were wondering what we had let ourselves in for. But the crowds of tourists are testament to how amazing this place is. It is a massive mine area that has been worked for its rock salt for about 500 years. Just the feats that have been accomplished to get this deep in the ground, to bring down horses to work, to eradicate the poisonous gases that build up and to get the salt out of the place is pretty special, but on top of that there are hundreds of sculptures all carved out of the rock salt over the years. There are scenes of favourite Polish legends, statues of kings and famous people, shops, a conference hall and images of those working the mine, but most impressive is a massive cathedral, fully dug out of the rock. The miners had 40 plus chapels in the mines, I guess they needed to pray on a regular basis in such a scary environment. This main cathedral is something else. With chandeliers made from wood and salt crystals, a tiled floor all carved out of rock salt and all the various biblical scenes, from the nativity to the crucifixion, engraved over the walls, this place has to be seen to be believed. Definitely well worth the crowds.

Just some of the shoes of those executed at Auschwitz

The other major tourist site outside of Krakow is Auschwitz-Birkenau. The site of an estimated one and a half million Nazi killings during WW2. These concentration/extermination camps were some of the most prolific and horrific. To visit them is one sombre experience. Auschwitz 1, which was set up as more of a work camp is now a museum to the tragedy and you can see everything from the shoes, suitcases and hair, which was all stockpiled from the camps unlucky inhabitants, through to the sleeping and living conditions and even the execution wall, where those who needed to be made an example of were shot. The Auschwitz 2 (Birkenau) site is more of a memorial, as there are not so many buildings left here. As this was the main execution site it is a very eerie place to walk around knowing that there were these massive extermination chambers here responsible for ending the lives of so many hundreds of thousands of Jews and other minorities that Hitler didn’t like. One quote from the place really stands out is “The one who does not remember history is bound to live through it again”.

The gates of Schindler’s Factory

We also did a tour of the Jewish quarter in Krakow, one of the biggest in Europe pre-WW2, and also the subsequent ghetto where the Jews where penned in before Hitler decided on the “Ultimate Solution” and the exterminations started. More very moving stuff and so hard to imagine such horrors could happen in the world. We had also watched Schindler’s List the night before, so we saw locations where scenes of the movie were filmed. Then the tour culminated at the Schindler Factory, which is at least a good story to come out of such a sad time, and as our guide informed us there were plenty of other stories of Poles saving Jews, which at least shows some positives for humanity. Away from the war side of things, the old Jewish quarter, Kazimierz, is actually quite a funky bar and restaurant area now and we were a little disappointed we only discovered it on our last day, as it looked to be a far more mellow and less sterile area than the main town square where we had been spending most of our time.

mmmmm…Moa Burger

In saying that there is still plenty to see in the Old Town main square. A big reason for this is that the area pretty much escaped WW2 with its architecture unscathed, so the place is visually stunning. The Cloth Market in the middle of the square is a cool old building, but it also has tunnels underneath where you can see exhibitions showing 100s of years of life that have been going on in this area. There is also Wavel Castle up on the hill to the south of the old town, which we only managed to quickly view from the outside, as there is just so much to do here. We also found a place touting itself as selling “The best NZ style burgers in Poland”. We had to give them a try and they were awesome, maybe the best NZ style burgers outside NZ, and better than some inside too. Plus they had heaps of kitsch Kiwiana decorating the place and played kiwi tunes the entire time. All the girs in the shop were Polish, but someone there must be representing New Zealand hard.

Warsaw’s reconstructed Old Town

After spending longer in Krakow than planned we weren’t too sure if we should stop off in Warsaw too, but we were glad we managed to slip in a couple of quick nights there. It has a far more modern big city feel than Krakow. We went out for a drink the first night to a funky little bar area where there were ten or so small bars in a little block of unused shops. We also did a tour of the Old Town and checked out the Polish Uprising Museum. The most interesting thing about the Old Town was that it’s not that old. The place was fully wiped out during WW2, so it has been completely reconstructed as it used to be, using paintings of the city that were commissioned by the various kings over the years. Looking at the place it is hard to know this without being told, so is pretty cool they have been able to reconstruct it so well. The Uprising Museum wasn’t as good as some of the Communism/Terror style museums we have seen, but it did show how unlucky the Poles have been over the years. After only getting their second independence in 1918, after being part of Prussia, Russia and Austria, they were then invaded by Germany and Russia at the start of WW2. Germany then attacked the Russians and took Poland for itself. When the Poles started their Uprising near the end of the war they expected help from the Russians and Allied forces, but they just left them and Hitler put his final efforts into obliterating Poland. This suited Russia as they had already done a deal with the allies that they would control Poland after the war, so they didn’t mind if the best Polish fighters were all wasted. All pretty sad really, and then they were stuck under Soviet communism for the next 45 years until the USSR started to fall apart in 1989.

Krakow at night – always something to do

Overall the Poles seem to have come out of this period pretty well and given their limited times of independence there is a fiercely patriotic spirit about the place. They want to ensure they maintain their nation this time. With the likes of Warsaw advancing as a modern cosmopolitan city and Krakow as one of the tourist cities of the world, there is no reason not to think they will continue to flourish as a proud independent nation.

You Melt My Heart – Melt Festival, Germany. (festival review)

For our second music festival in two weeks we were off to Melt in Germany. Although the weather wasn’t hot enough to melt anything, the event still lived up to its catchphrase “Melt your heart”. We absolutely loved it and had a brilliant time. The music and the venue made it, but there was generally just such a great vibe that you couldn’t help but have fun. Plus we did have one of our favourite bands on the line up, Bloc Party, so I guess it couldn’t really go wrong.

The festival site as you walk from the camping/parking area

The venue itself was absolutely fantastic. Based at Ferropolis, an old East German mine site about 1 and a half hours out of Berlin, the old machinery that dotted the landscape made for a visual spectacular. Plus the old mine has been filled in to make a large lake, so it was an awesome mix of nature and man-made wonders. One slightly annoying thing was the distance from the camping/parking area to the main site, but once we worked out the shuttle bus set up it wasn’t too bad. We did walk it a couple of times, which was pleasant enough alongside the lake, and it was pretty cool as the big machinery loomed in the distance with the festival marquees in between them. Some of the old mining equipment was set up with huge mirror balls on them and as nightfall came they lit them up in all colours to make it extra special.

Bloc Party absolutely owning the main stage

Music-wise it was the first night we were most excited about as that was when Bloc Party were headlining. And Kele and the boys did not disappoint with a set that included all the classics plus four or five new tracks from their album that is out this month. Although their midnight set was the only time that in rained on the first day (consistently for the entire set), nothing was going to stop us having a good dance. We were up on the seat/steps on the right side of the stage and had plenty of room to jump around to the likes of “This Modern Love”, “The Prayer”, “Hunting for Witches”, “Mercury”, “Flux” and plenty more in the 1.5 hour set.

On that first day there were plenty of other music highlights too with M83, Caribou, The Ravonettes and a few of the DJs on the outer stages all putting in stellar performances to get us primed for the big one, Bloc Party. Nero was on after them and although they played a massive set of all their hits, they did not compare, plus their female MC was even spotted lip-syncing to a couple of their more popular tracks.

View from the beach stage looking back to main festival

After a massive first day we were a bit hazy on the second and spent a bit of time down at the beach stage chilling out. Here we caught a great set from Araab DJ in the late afternoon. It was a real pity that the weather was so cold and wet, as this stage would have been even more spectacular on a hot sunny day with people able to swim or chill on the beach right next to the stage.

Two Door Cinema Club rocking the main stage on Day 2

Musical standouts for us on the second day were Two Door Cinema Club, who was the only band to make it to Melt that we had seen at Rock for People also. This time they had a later set, which they showed they deserved, ripping it up with their poppy rock hits and getting the main stage crowd rocking as much as we saw it for the entire festival. Also of note on day 2 were Chairlift, who played a mellow early evening set with their big hit Amanamanesia finishing it off. And Blood Red Shoes showed that for a band consisting of a drummer and a lead guitarist that they could sure make a big noise and put on a great rock show, as they showed their wares in an early afternoon timeslot on the main stage. The Gossip was the headliner on the main stage of Day 2, but they weren’t really our cup of tea, so we headed back to our car/home for the night.

Our Station Wagon rental – home for 3 days

We didn’t really get a chance to see much of the campsite life as we were staying in the car in the parking lot. We decided that due to the poor weather renting a station wagon was a safe idea. We would have had to buy a tent and organised transport anyway, so this was a similar priced option to ensure we had somewhere dry and safe to stay each night. Apart from being a bit on our own in the carpark, this turned out to be a great option as the 20euro airbed we bought fitted perfectly into the back and provided 3 adequate night’s sleep. We were especially happy on the morning of the second day when it rained for a number of hours and we were able to relax and read our books in the dry of our little station wagon home.

We also stocked up with super market snacks so these were able to keep us going when we were away from the main food area of the festival. But that is not to say we did not try the array of great food that was on offer there. It was all a fair bit more expensive than Rock for People, including the beer, but still not as bad as a festival downunder. Full strength beers were 4euro, while you could get the majority of food options for about 4-6euro. These included some great sticky bbq pork rolls, cheesy filled bread, Indian, Thai plus your standard sausages, burgers and kebabs, all of which was of a very acceptable standard.

Sweet little Lana Del Ray

Although we were planning to get up early the following day to get back to Berlin, we wanted to make the most of our third and final day at Melt, so we tried to get in early afternoon to catch Lana Del Ray. Lots of people had the same idea and there was a huge queue to get into the event, similar to what we experienced on the first day. This was maybe one of our only criticisms with the lines for entry, toilets and food all a bit on the excessive side at times, which, considering it is a regular festival venue, you would think could be managed better.

Whitest Boy Alive finishing the festival for us with a bang

We did manage to catch the last couple of songs of the sultry sensation and she had a crowd whose size showed she is definitely popular the world over. Although the last day did not contain the big headline names of the first two, there were still a couple of great performances. In the late afternoon timeslot on the main stage Australian band The Jezebels put on a great rock show with the little pocket rocket lead singer, Hayley Mary, doing Aussie proud with her great lyrical ability and pure energy. Also our final set of the night was a great way to finish, with Whitest Boy Alive getting the crowd buzzing for one of the last acts to play the main stage, leaving us with a smile from ear to ear as we left the magic venue for the final time. It really was a great festival that left our heart melted and wanting more. Maybe we will get back there one day; we would recommend it for sure.

Berlin – One of the hottest cities in the world despite its cold past

Germany, well Berlin anyway, was a part of our journey that we had been looking forward to, as it was an opportunity to stay in the one place for a while. Plus we had another music festival to go to, so there were plenty of reasons to be excited. The reason we could stay so long was thanks to the great hospitality of Jared’s friend Victoria, who allowed us to stay at her apartment for the duration of our time in Berlin. This meant we could cook our own meals, do some much needed washing and generally just chill out from the regular routine we had established of moving every few days. And to top off all that, Berlin is one of the coolest cities in the world, so we had the opportunity to check it out at a more leisurely pace.

As we had not gone to the last day of the rock festival in Czech, we were ready to party by the time we arrived in Berlin. This was lucky, as Victoria had a good little shindig lined up for us. It was an album release gig for some band she knew, which turned out to be a very punk rock affair, complete with all the trimmings of that particular scene: leather jackets, mohawks, piercing and colourful hair (and a stern warning not to drink anything not in a bottle, as they had spiked the shots with LSD at the last party). It was a good time but by 2am it was getting pretty late for us, so we managed to make our way back to Victoria’s on our own and left her to party the night away.

Chicken Parmigiana at Victoria’s – good times doing our own cooking

The next few days were more about orientating ourselves with the neighbourhood, which was right on the edge of the popular Kreuzberg suburb. It was not right in the heart of this but there is still plenty of interesting parks and cafes around and Kreuzberg proper is not too far away for the bar and nightlife scene. Being the massive cosmopolitan city that Berlin is it meant there was plenty of entertainment of all types to be had. Food wise we had sushi, pizza, kebabs, Caribbean, Chinese, as well as the local German specialty Currywurst. We also sampled 6 or 7 different beers. All of which were tasty and easily compete with anything else we have tasted in Europe. Price-wise the city is still cheaper than the likes of Australia or NZ for these sorts of things, but it is not far behind and is definitely a step up from what we had been paying in the rest of Eastern Europe.

Checkpoint Charlie – where West used to meet East

From a tourist perspective Berlin is an interesting city, as there is not really an Old City heart to it like there is in so many other old European places we have been. In particular the divide that existed between East and West Berlin has played a big part in this, but also there are just a number of interesting places in various locations well worth checking out. For us we have concentrated a lot on the Holocaust and communism through our travels so far and decided to continue this theme, as Germany was obviously a major factor in both of these.

Holocaust Memorial – great piece of art to commemorate one awful event

From the Holocaust side of things we checked out two of the Memorial/Museum sites that both commemorate the massive loss of life but also outline the horrific nature of the events surrounding it. The Topography of Terror is a massive photo exhibition, part of which runs alongside remnants of the Berlin Wall and part in a large museum, which outlines in minute detail all the aspects of brutality and fear perpetrated by the Nazis. It starts pre-war and goes right through to the finish in 1945, including info on what happened to the biggest criminals, most of whom were able to walk away with little or no punishment. The Holocaust Memorial is an interesting sculpture of rectangular pillars all covering some undulated ground, which has to be seen to understand its dramatic effect. It may not be as sombre as some of the other memorials we have viewed, but it is a great piece of artwork worthy of such an important memorial. Within the memorial’s information centre is an exhibition dedicated specifically to the Jewish people that suffered and in majority lost their lives in this awful period. It is in a way like a mini Yad Vashem (Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem) and does a good job of telling the sad and horrific tale, while providing a memorial to the victims.

One of the classic pieces of art on the Berlin Wall at the East Side Gallery

The main other topic that you cannot miss in Berlin is the effect that communism had on the city, splitting it in half between East and West and putting in on the frontline of the Cold War between the US and the USSR. There are a few places where you can still see remnants of the Berlin Wall and the one that is the most visually interesting is the East Side Gallery, where there are a number of paintings that cover the entirety of the concrete partition. These had been updated and made a bit nicer since Jared had last been here, which took away from the authenticity a little, but in terms of a memorial and artwork signifying the time it is well worth a look. It is not until you get to the Checkpoint Charlie area, where they have an open air exhibit that you get more of an idea what the wall meant to this great city. With images of American and Russian tanks facing each other down, maps of how West Berlin was in a sense an island in the sea of Communism and stories of those that were shot trying to escape the tyranny of the East, you really do get a feeling why this city still has such a massive hangover from these east v west days, before the wall came down. Locals still talk of the differences between East and West Berliners and the different styles of architecture and even clothing between the two is quite apparent.

New meets old. TV Tower and a Church

A couple of other touristy things we did were going to the history museum and take a river cruise on the Spree. Although quite different as an intellectual stimulation, again both showcased the variety that is Berlin. As you travel down the river, in what was only a one hour boat trip, you see such a wide mixture of buildings, from new glass and steel structures built in recent years, to old Museums and churches that managed to survive the war. At the history museum, like a lot of East Europe, the story revolves around the struggle for and moves towards becoming an independent country, which did not happen to the late 1800s, and the pride and desire to keep it that way that has influenced the leaders to play such a large part in both World Wars.

These days Berlin, and probably Germany as a whole, is a leader in Europe in most regards. Its working conditions, opportunity, entertainment, recreation, diversity, transport networks, public policy and livelihood in general are the envy of many. It is great to see that it has come through the dark times with such energy and vitality and the hope is that it continues to move forward in this way. For us our stay here, and in particular with Victoria was one of relaxation and good times, but in general Berlin is much more complex and interesting a destination to go to for just these simple pleasures.