Trains

From tube, local trains, express trains through to the Shinkansen, you can be sure of one thing, trains in Japan are clean, efficient and relatively cheap. The ticket machines give you a bit of a headache at first but you do have the option of choosing English, and if your still unsure you just pay the cheapest fare and at the other end top up on the fare adjustment machines. If your planning to live in Japan then its worth getting a Suica card (top up swipe card just like the oyster card in London) and with a Suica you can also pay for drinks etc. from the vending machines on the platform. Unlike in the UK there are markers on the platforms stating where the doors will open when the train comes to a halt and everyone forms an orderly cue, none of the free for all you now see in London.


As I mentioned before, just before the train leaves a departure tune is played, now these tunes vary depending what line, station or platform you are on and when the tune stops, you have on average about ten seconds before the doors shut, very very handy. A few stations are famous for their departure tunes, like Ebisu and Shinagawa on the Yamanota line in Tokyo and most Japanese I have spoken to recognize these tunes. To give you a taste, click on the play button below, all the tunes are from various platforms and stations from the JR line.

JR Departure Music

そば soba

So off to Tokyo Friday lunch time with virgin airways, surprisingly the food was extremely dodgy for one of the worlds top airlines, but the In-Flight entertainment didn`t disappoint so I ended up watching Gordon f`ing Ramsay, The Simpsons movie and managing about 45 minutes sleep. After arriving in Tokyo I jumped on the YCAT (Yokohama city air terminal) bus to central Yokohama which is south of Tokyo, then a JR train to Totsuka, meeting Fumiko outside starf`cks at 2pm that afternoon. On the way to Fumiko`s flat in Minamiyato (south valley) a suburb south of Totsuka, we popped into Denny`s an American style diner, serving Japanese and dodgy `western` food for some noodles.

Looking down on the Japanese Alps


That evening we jumped on the bus to Totsuka, 190Yen (230 Yen - 1 Pound) to an Izakaya, a Japanese style pub, serving a wide range of food from sashimi, yakatori to salads and pizza!. Although the Izakaya in Totsuka is part of chain the food is excellent, will try to get some pics of the food at some point. The following day was more of a day of relaxation, shopping at Modi next to Totsuka station, a 7 floor department store. The ground and the basement is dedicated to food, the first floor selling chocolates and cakes and the basement containing a supermarket and individual shops selling bread, organic products from hand cream to noodles and international foods. The shop selling international foods has improved since last year, selling good Parmesan, Thai curry paste and Tim Tams, one of the few great things to come out of Australia!. The Tim Tam is not only a good chocolate biscuit (similar to the penguin but better), when eaten in the correct way it is transformed into gastronomic experience!, and here's how.....

A taste of Dorset in Totsuka!

That evening we ate Zaru Soba, cold Soba noodles with a dipping sauce, Soba noodles are usually made from buckwheat(no relation to wheat) and wheat flour although some noodles are made from 100% buckwheat flour. Then it was early to bed in order to get up bright and early for our trip to Takayama, situated on the western side of the Japanese Alps. Leaving at 5am, it took a good two hours before we were out into the country side where for the first time I got a glimpse of Mt Fuji in the distance. To reach Takayama we had to pass over the Japanese Alps, reaching a height of 1760m at which point the journey got rather tricky, at one point the road was totally covered in solid ice, so in a tunnel at -1 degree it was time to get out the snow chains.

First glimpse of Fuji san

After a seven hour drive we finally arrived in Takayama. We had booked a room at a Minshiku named Oyado Iguchi, a Minshiku is similar to a B&B in the west, except in a Minshiku you have the option of dinner. Takayama is famous for Old inns, shops and sake breweries, eight breweries in all! a bit of sightseeing it was time to return to the Minshiku for dinner and a dip in the Onsen (hot spring). The Japanese love Onsens and with around 3000 public Onsens in Japan they are hard to avoid. A lot of Hotels, Ryokans and Minshikus also have Onsens, some being 100% natural, the Onsen at Oyado takes water from Hida-Takayam hot spring, which needs to be heated and filtered before use. So after a relaxing Onsen we enjoyed some wonderful home cooked Japanese food.

Ichi-no-Machi, Takayama

The following morning we headed south to the town of Minokamo city a two hour drive from Takayama where I had arranged a visit to Sakurai Foods who make soba noodles for a company called Clearspring which specialize in organic products. At the Food Hall in John Lewis we sell a range of Clearspring products including the Soba noodles made by Sakurai foods. We arrived at the factory just before 11am and was introduced to Mr Sakurai himself, as customary in Japan I had brought a gift, the Japanese do like their whisky and its always a safe bet, so I had brought with me a bottle of Peat Monster a blended whisky from Compass Box and a tin of Earl Grey tea with Blue Flowers from Willamson Tea which is only available in the food hall. Sakurai Foods predominantly make noodles for the domestic market with around 20% going overseas, mainly to the US where the organic market is growing the fastest.

Clearspring All Buckwheat Soba Noodles

Buckwheat flour from the US is used to make the Soba noodles for the UK, this is because the Japanese organic association allow farmers to use certain chemicals which are banned by organic associations in the US and the UK. The buckwheat flour is mixed with water a salt then mixed together for 20 minutes before being compressed then sent through a machine with 5 different sized rollers before going through the cutting roller. The noodles are then layed onto a bamboo polls and sent up buy an ancient looking contraption to the first floor where the noodles are hung to dry for 2 days. This natural drying process allows the noodles to slightly fermentate which gives the noodle a very slight sourness. When the noodles have dried they are cut and then weighed and packed by hand. After the tour of the factory we visited an organic shop owned by Sakurai sans daughter and son in law from Bristol who spoke very good Japanese, then it was off to a Soba restaurant in town for lunch, Zaru Soba served with tempura of vegetables and prawns which were cooked to perfection.

Ready to dry

The return to Golders Green

Maguro, Hot Dogs & Friends

No doubt your all still wondering what happened between Beijing and Japan, the plan was to spend a few days in Beijing then get a flight back over to Tokyo from either Beijing or Shanghai. Now during my time in western China I did look at other routes and countries to travel, I looked into a fligth to Baku, Azerbaijan, then head overland through Georgia and Turkey then fly back the the UK from Istanbul, with the flight costing 250 pounds to Baku from Urumqi. I was extremely close to central aisa, I could have got a 3 day transit visa at the airport in Almaty, Krygyzstan but that only gave me 3 days to get a visa for another central asian country and get out. Pakistan was another option and its surprising the amount of travelers traveling through in the present political climate, but I could only get a visa from Beijing or England. Next i thought about heading to Thailand for a couple of weeks, the flight costing 90 pounds from Chengdu to Bangkok but the real killer was the flight from Urumqi to Chengdu, 160 pounds. To make it worth while, flying to Bangkok was the only option, I didn't have time to take the train and getting there was going to cost me 240 pounds and I still had to get another visa for China in Bangkok and get a flight back to Shanghia.



Michael and friends, Shanghai

During all is commotion, Michael in Shanghai was doing all the leg work, finding out different prices and times for flights, then having to do it all again every few days!. After arriving in Beijing my mind was made up, plans were made and Michael and the tickets to Tokyo were waiting for me in Shanghia, a big thankyou to you Michael for all your time and trouble. The flight to Tokyo was at lunch time on the 24th, but I had to arrive in Shanghai at least a day before that to collect the tickets, which ment I had to take an over night train on the 22nd, leaving me with only one evening and three quaters of a day in Beijing. That evening and my only evening in Beijing, I went out to eat Beijing duck with a girl from Middlesbrough, costing 38RMB for a whole duck, thats two and a half quid!.


Tokyo to Shanghai

The next morning I went off to visit the summer palace, one of Beijing's best sights, then it was over to a couple of parks in the city and then down to an antiques market, this took up most of my day, so it was back to the hostel for some food and off the the train station to catch my train at 7pm to Shanghia, a 12 hour journey, 500RMB. The following day I picked up my flight ticket and that evening went out with Michael and a few more friends and ate excellent hunanese food, which is very similar to Sichuan food, full of chilli. The next morning I got a bus to the airport, 15RMB and after a very expensive sandwich and coffee it was of to Tokyo and Totsuka to see Fumiko.


Meguro man!

During my stay in Japan I had to get another visa for China so i could get back into the country in order to catch my flight back to the UK. Thanks to the Chinese national holiday I had to pay nearly double the price of the visa for the express service, 7000 Yen, as they were closing for 10 days. Fumiko and I went back to the local market near Totsuka again to visit the Maguro(tuna) man, as ever, always smiling and once again, extremely generous giving us two types of tuna as a gift. His business is inside a local market and he sells mainly to restaurants, plus any passing trade. The following monday,2nd october, he was opening a sushi restaurant in the market, so we decided to go and visit the restaurant on the 3rd, on our way to the airport. We had excellent sushi and rolled sushi with green tea then we went to say our goodbyes, but before we could, he sat us down so we could eat dessert!, an apple flavoured drink with ice and a japanese red bean dessert and to top it off, he gave me a T shirt from his new business.

Koichi, Xinjiang province, western China

So again, it was goodbye to Fumiko and Japan and back to Shanghai for the 4th time on this trip. Koichi, the japanese guy who I traveled with in western China had kindly let me crash at his pad for a couple of nights before heading back to the UK, he rents a hotel room right in the heart of Shanghia's business centre, Pudong, with a fantastic view over looking the river and surrounded by futuristic buildings. That night we ate hotpot and then watched a rerun of the world hot dog eating championships from New York, with a japanese guy, Takeru Kobayashi, winning it for the 6th consecutive time, crazy stuff!. My last full day in Shanghai consisted of shopping and by the time I had got back to Pudong it was straight back out again to met Bart who was in Shanghia sorting out his visa, although, I barely recognized him since he had shaved!. We went to a japanese izakaya, recommended by Koichi, where you could eat and drink as much as you like for 98RMB per person, a great meal with lots of japanese beer and plum wine, along with the great company, it made a fitting end to my 3 months here out in the far east.

Bart, say no more!

An early start the next morning, Koichi was off to Hongkong to get a 1 years chinese visa, so an hour or so in starbucks to kill some time, then off the Pudong international airport via the maglev, a train that reaches a speed of 431km per hour and travels 30km in eight minutes, all for £2.80, 40RMB. It was now time to head back to the UK with China eastern airlines, a very very average airline and in true China eastern stlye they didn't disappoint, for the 12 hour flight the inflight entertainment was not working, paper cups were running low so they were asking people to keep hold of the ones they had and they had run out of red wine on a flight with very few laowei!. So arriving back in the UK at heathrow terminal 2, I waited 30 minutes for my baggage as there were 3 flights coming in on the same small baggage carousel!, then I jumped on the piccadilly line to Kings cross and northern line to Golders Green, arriving back to 35 the vale in the rain at 10pm UK time.

Back at The Vale, Golders Green

The highlight of traveling is not so much of what you see but the people you meet, who are often from different countries and different back grounds, its definatly a thing I will really miss.

My quick stint out in the far east has now finished and i'm back in London, its time to return back to reality, get a job and earn some cash. Although goddsontour is no more, don't worry, i'm sure i'll be back soon, but in the mean time keep an eye out for goddsinjapan, coming soon.......

Totsuka

A different world

Now i did`t get chance to tell you about this place when I was here last, so now i`m back, i`d better fill you in and give you in a insight into life in Totsuka and Japan. Coming to Japan from china is like entering a different world, clean, organized and efficient, quite the opposite to China. From the airport you can jump on the ycat (Yokohama city air terminal) bus, which is a one hour and 30 min drive to central Yokohama for around 20 pounds. Once in Yokohama, its a 10 min walk to the JR( japanese rail) line where you catch a train on the tokaido line to Totsuka, taking around 10 mins non stop. The trains on the tokaido line are around 15 carriages long and there is next to no chance at getting a seat, especially at rush our when getting the `crazy train`, the reserved and polite japanese politly push and shove each other until everyone is packed in so tightly, like sardines in a can. Just like the UK, no one talks to anyone else on the train, some read japanese comic books, send e mails on their phones or just sleep, some how waking up just before their stop. Signs are everywhere asking for mobile phones to be switched off, so you never here the sound of a ringtone or someone talking on the phone, all very japanese.

The tokaido line

Buying a ticket is rather straight forward apart from one thing, knowing how much each journey is going to cost you. The ticket machines give you an option of how many passengers and various ticket prices, but if you want to know how much its going to cost you to reach your destination, then you`ll need to understand japanese. But there is no need to panic as there is one saving grace, the fare adjustment machine at your destination. When buying your ticket, buy the cheapest fare and at the fare adjustment machine the other end, just pop your ticket in and pay the fee shown on the screen, it saves all that embarrassment, plus holding up the other ten thousand people waiting behind you with their electronic swipe cards.

totsuka central at sunrise

Its quite simple, the trains here are never late and i mean never. They arrive within 2 minutes of the departure time and then about 20 seconds before the train is due to leave, a litte tune is played which vary from line to line, very handy if your in the process of walking up the stairs to the platform, then around ten seconds after the tune has finished, the doors close and the train leaves, on time. Just upstairs from the station exit at Totsuka is marui(oioi), a 7 story department store, on the basement is a supermarket then on the ground floor is a food hall selling all kinds of treats, from bread, sushi, bento boxes through to high quality cakes and chocolates, plus a starbucks. Right outside is Totsuka bus station, where you can get the bus to Minamiyato, a 10 minute bus ride to where Fumiko lives, costing 190yen.

Bus to minamiyato

The centre of Totsuka is not so large, but has everything you need for day to day living. There are the standerd japanese restaurant chains like mos burger and denny`s, an american style restaurant and for cash, the only place you normaly can withdraw money from, is the post office. You never go far in Japan without seeing a convenience store, these are great little stores selling all sorts of goods from dodgy comic books for men to milk, bread, snacks, sake, soft drinks, cheese, tofu,vegetables, hot fast food and hot tinned coffee which, quite frankly, is disgusting. These little beauties are everywhere, the most famouse being 7 eleven, they are often open 24 hours a day and are also great places to stop if your on a long journey.

Japans No.1 convenience store

It takes 40 minutes on the trian to get to central Tokyo, 10 minutes to central Yokohama and 15 minutes to Kamakura. Traveling around tokyo seems a bit daunting at first, but once you get used to the fare adjustment machine and understand the tube map !, then your on your way. There are loads of chained coffee shops in Japan, most allow smoking, some of which are of dubious quality, others offer the morningu setto, or a selection of breads and pastries, some of which are definalty not for western tastes. Eating at lunchtime can prove to be a bit of a challenge, a lot of places can be in the basement or on the first floor and the signs are in japanese, and once you`ve found one then you have to try to understand the menu.

Plastic lunch anyone?

There are quite a few restaurants with picture menus, so pointing usually gets you what you want. Its common for restaurants to have plastic life size samples of their dishes in the shop window, ranging from soba noodles, sushi and drinks right through to spaghetti bolognese and hamburger and fries. Kappabashi ( kitchen town), is the place where you can buy various types of these plastic samples, but they`re not cheap, some costing around 80 pounds. The other day i was walking through Tokyo and in the shop window was half a loaf of bread with some ice cream on top, i`m still wondering if i actually dreamt it or not.

Kappabashi

Kashgar to Beijing

So it was time to leave Kashgar and head back eastwards towards Shanghia. I really didn't want to leave Kashgar and in hind sight i left a little to soon but my train ticket to Turpan was booked so that was that. On the way to the train station the taxi driver was listening to Uihgur music, one song which i captured on video was very nice, listen here . I had booked a hard sleeper to Turpan, this time around in China i haven't been to keen on hard sleepers but this is the only hard sleeper that i know of that has 4 beds and is more enclosed. The train was busy and i ended up in a 4 bed room with 3 Uihgurs who worked for the CCP(Chinese communist party) tax office. The train journey was 22 hours and i arrived in Turpan at 1pm the following day, i went straight to Johns cafe, a very very basic chain of cafes on the 'silk road' for information on where to stay. I had some lunch then this guy approached me regarding tours on sights around the area. Just before he spoke to me he spoke to a french guy not sitting far from me, he then called the guy over to talk about price. We finally agreed on a price which involved the sights we wanted to see, sharing with a couple in a taxi.



Chris, cutting up some tasty melon at jiahe

The french guy, Chris, said he was staying across the road, 30RMB a night for a dorm room, you got one token for the shower room which along with the toilets was about 100m away from the dorm room, opposite an open air restaurant!. That night Chris and i went to the night market and we had some seriously good roast chicken along with some lamb kebabs and a beer. The following morning, i met up with Chris, to find out that it was now a minibus and there were more people, so we renegotiated the price and off we went, with us were the couple from the cezch republic, Nicky, a woman from Belgium and two chinese guys. On the tour we stopped at the flamming mountains, which cost 40 RMB, but you walk 100m to the point where the fence ends and then you can see for free. Next up, was the ancient city of Tuyoq, which was great, then onto a few more sights which the chinese guys wanted to see, after a noodle lunch we set of to see a few more sights ending with another ancient city by the name of jiahe, which was fascinating.

The mosque at jiahe

The following day i booked the night bus to Dunhuang which is famous for the Mogao caves, on the bus was the woman from belguim and a japanese guy, Koichi and some vile chinese women!. It was a 12 hour journey, but in true chinese style it ended up being a 16 hour journey, we checked in at a hotel by the bus station and had some lunch, then it was off to the caves. I had heard mixed reports about the Mogao caves and was thinking about giving it a miss, until i spoke to Chris the french guy in Turpan. There is a 100RMB entrance fee ( no guide ) and then you are able to see 10 of the 492 caves which are open to the public, you are able to see more , its china remember, so just open that wallet and off you go. Having only seen a picture of the caves in one of the guide books, i wasn't expecting too much, but boy, was i surprised, very very impressvie and to save spending the next half hour writing about it, click here to get all the information you need.

On the way to the dunes, dunhuang

After the caves we headed back into Dunhuang and hired a bike for 2RMB to ride to the sandunes just outside of the town. Time wasn't on our side and it took around 35 mintues to get to the dunes. There is a 80 RMB entrance fee to the dunes and one thing i don't like to do is pay to see nature, so we headed west on dirt tracks to find the end of the fence. What with having difficulty with finding the end of the fence and taking at least 10 mins to lock our bikes, the sun had just about set, so it was a scramble to the dunes, just before the dunes there was a sign in chinese, stating a 200RMB fine if you passed that point, the dune was huge and very very steep, and with it being sand it took for ever to get anywhere, by half way i was done, Koichi was able to get 3 quaters of the way up, but by this time the light was starting to go, time and the dunes had won plus being stingy didn't help!.

Half way up a dune

The following day we got the bus to Jaiuguan, a six hour bus journey, so eight hours later we arrived in Jaiyuguan and checked into a very drab hotel, we headed over to a restaurant across the road and we ate Sichaun food, the second best Sichaun food i have had in China, then to bed for the next days sightseeing. In the morning we got up early to check out the train and bus times to Lanzhou, Koichi who speaks chinese got talking to a guy about the days sightseeing and eventually came to arrangement which involed all the sights we wanted to see. We then headed off the chemist to get some antibiotics as it was the 4th day in a row that i had diarrhea!. The days sightseeing included a trip to the Xincheng Dixia Hualang, an underground burial sight, Overhanging wall, a restord part of the wall from the sixteenth century, Jaiyuguan Fort and the first Beacon tower also from the sixteenth century, which was the best of the lot.

Over hanging wall, jaiyuguan

That evening we got the train to Lanzhou, we had been extremly lucky to get the last 4 tickets at the station. The train arrived in at Lanzhou at 9am, i had been to Lanzhou 4 years ago, as its the gateway to southern Gansu and Sichuan. Everone went their separate ways and i set out to book my ticket to Beijing and find one nights accommodation, which in all took 4 hours thanks to the rude and unfriendly staff at various places, plus traveling to western Lanzhou to a guesthouse to find it had closed down. That afternoon i visted the yellow river and had a couple of kebabs and a coke for dinner. The following day i arrived in Beijing, and checked in at the Far east international youth hostel, where i had stayed two years before, a small place with a lovely courtyard set in hutong not far from Tiananmen Square, selling a bottle of cold beer (660ml) at 2RMB!, 7 beers for a quid!!!.

The yellow river, lanzhou

Sunday Bazaar & Lake Karakul

Kashgar Sunday Bazaar


Kashgar is famed for its sunday bazaar and the guide books rave about it, ' the mother off all markets' , says The Rough Guide. So after the market at Yarkand expectations were high and so they should be, considering its supposed to be the larkest market in central asia. The market kicks off at around 8 am, Xinjiang time and was advised to get there early, i arrived around 8 but not much was going on, people were still arriving and laying out their goods. I decided to get some breakfast, hot milk and You tiao, deep fried dough, 1.5 RMB. then took another walk, by this time things were starting to happen. The market was all out doors until 3 years ago, then a large market square with a cover was built called the Central asia market (open 7 days a week). The goods you can buy inside the Central asia market are mainly clothes, pashmire silk scarfs, rugs, herbs and spices, such as iranian saffron, knives, various hats and pots. Out and around the indoor market is all the fresh produce, garden tools, mouse traps, cats for pets, places to eat and the donkey 'car park'!, there is an animal market but from two people i have spoken to, there were more foriegn tourists than animals, same same but different!.

You Tiao, Kashgar sunday bazaar

Its common to see Uihgur people having a heated discusion or pushing and pulling each other, but it seems to be quiet a harmless activity and makes a stroll that little more exciting. I saw one of these in the market, what it was about i have no idea but was all over in just a few minutes. In the whole, the sunday Bazaar was definatly an anti climax, nothing like what you read in the guide books or on the net and everyone here i speak to feels the same but its still far better than any other market in other parts of China i have been to which are dominated by the Han chinese. By 12 noon xinjiang time, i headed back to the hotel via the old town which has a smaller bazaar selling much the same stuff but with blacksmiths and ironmongers hammering away. Kashgar isn't just the sunday market, its the people and the way they go about thier lives, old men sitting drinking tea with long beards and weatherd faces is a common sight, one which i never get boared off.

Kashgar sunday bazaar


Lake Karakul

There are two ways to get to Lake Karakul, one by public bus costing around 50RMB one way or by private car/taxi costing 400RMB for a day return costing between 700RMB and 950RMB for an overnight stay including a night in a yurt, plus dinner and breakfast. I put a message up on the various notice boards for more people to share a private car and costs, within one day, two girls(australian/american) had left a message under my door. I had various quotes and decided to go with on travel company, until the desert trip, where our driver offered to do it for 500RMB. We arranged to meet up with the girls to discuss the trip but a mix up with local time and Beijing time ment the driver turned up two hours late. I met the girls at 10pm Beijing time, but they had decided to go with another travel agent, leaving me and the driver in the cold. I couldn't afford to pay 500RMB on my own so it was up to me to call the driver at 10.30pm to tell the driver that the trip was off, i was not a happy bunny, but luckly Alex, the guy from the desert trip could speak chinese and explained to him what happend for me.

Preparing Yak milk tea, Lake Karakul

The following morning we left at 9am Beijing time and the drive took just under four hours, at one point we had to stop at a check point, get out of the car and walk thought to an office where they checked our passports. When we arrived, we were taken in the a hut and given some hot tea with yak milk which was rather salty plus a small bowl of meat fried with onions, well actually lambs heart with the arteries thrown in, which was very very chewy!. I decided to walk around the lake, lake Karakul is 3600m above sea level and is surround by Mt Muztagata ( 7564m ) and the Pamir mountians which boarder Pakistan. On the way around i passed Yaks and goats grazing and the tourist area where there is an expensive hotel and restaurant, plus thousands of tiny flies which smotherd you every so often.

Kyrgyz family, Lake Karakul

In the distance was a Kyrgyz village, so i took a walk over,the village was very small and not much going on, some children came over shouting hello and an old man came over, they invited me in for some food, which consisted of stale bread and fresh yogurt which was very sour, i talked to the grand daughter in my very basic chinese, enough to get point across, then it was outside for the family photo shoot!. I said my goodbyes then carried on, on the entire walk i only saw one other tourist and he was on a horse, at the lake you can hire horses, camels and even a yak if you wish.

Getting hot, Lake Karakul

After about four hours the heat was getting to me and the walk became a little more challenging, the entire walk took five and a half hours and was back at the Yurt just in time for some hot tea, this time with no yak milk or salt. That evening we ate mutton and vegetables and rice which was very tasty, by 11pm it had turned very cold and windy, so before heading to bed i sat in the taxi and stared up at the beautiful night sky with the odd shooting star thrown in. The following morning i was up for sunrise then it was stale bread and tea for breakast, we then headed back and arrived back in Kashgar around 13.30 Beijing time. I checked back in to the Seman hotel and then headed across the road to the Pakistan cafe and ate chicken jalfrezi, mutton paratha and chi for lunch, then back to the hotel for a shower to find that there was no water, its now at 20.13 and still no water!.

Mt Muztagata and Lake Karakul

Xinjiang

Urumqi

Urumqi is the capital of Xinjiang province and is the most landlocked city in the world, over 2000 km from the nearest ocean with a popluation of over 2 million people. I arrived from Chengdu at around 5:30pm and got a shuttle bus which dropped me of somewhere in the city, after an hour of fun i finally arrived at the xinjiang youth hostel, where a bed in a very cramped 5 bed dorm cost 45 RMB, again full of high quality chinese snorers plus the toilets were vile. In some toilets in China, you're not allowed to put the toilet paper down the toilet, so it needs to go into a bin by the side, usually right beside you so you can enjoy that lovely spring time aroma. Just after i checked in, i met Bart, a slightly mad dutch guy who was cycling from turkey overland to Indonisia on a second hand bike(with dodgy pedals) he bought in Turkey!, so we headed up into the Uighur part fo the city to find some food. The Uighur diet mainly consits of bread, mutton, rice, noodles and kebabs, we found this bread that had lamb inside, a little like the indian keema nan, which was delicious and watched a guy walk the tight rope near the city mosque.

Bart, on his way to Indonisia!

The next morning Bart set off east to Turpan and i headed off to the bank of China to get some more cash, after that i burned some pics onto CD with the help from a computer company, thrown in was an excellent home cooked lunch and to top it off thay booked my flight for me to Kashgar, you certainly don't get this kind of hospitality in the west from strangers. After i headed off to the fubar, a bar owned by a guy from New Zealand and a guy from Japan, to get some info on Kashgar, then off to the airport.

Kashgar

Now Kashgar is 5800km from London and 5513km from Tokyo so nearly half way home already, its around 300km away from the pakistan boarder, 200km away from the Krygyzstan boarder and is 4176km away from Shanghai where my flight leaves on the 5th October. I didn't plan to get this far west until i got chatting to another dutch guy in Chengdu named Herbert, Herbert is a journalist in Holland and has been traveling for the last 30 years, he wasn't drunk but his eyes were bulging with passion when he started to tell me about Kashgar, it was then i knew i had to come here, check out his website ( dutch). Kashgar is famous for its sunday market, the biggest in central asia and is estimated that around 30 -40,000 people converge here every sunday, it also has a large Uighur popluation, much larger than that of the chinese.

Nan(bread), the main staple in Kashgar

I checked into Semen hotel after arriving, a 2 bed room for 60RMB, the following morning i checked out and checked into the Qinibagh hotel just in front of the old British embassy, which was 30 RMB for a dorm bed in a 5 bed dorm. That afternoon i checked out the old town and then ended up eating some chinese food at Johns cafe just in front of the hotel, by 5 am the following morning i had bad stomch pains and after an hour or so a mass exodus of liquid left my body!, so in bed the whole day then yogurt and fruit for dinner. That evening i was lying on my bed when a cockroach ran down my bed along side me, now in all my travels i have never seen a cockroach on my bed, although i'm sure millions of them have run over me while i've been asleep. I love all 'gods creatures' bar two, mosquitos and cockroaches, oh sorry and spiders!. I despise cockroaches and i'm sure they flew in on some space craft millions of years ago, now you may think i am going a little over the top on this one, well lets have a look.

The 'vile' Cockroach

5000 different species of the little bastards.

The females mate only once then are pregnant for the rest of their lives.

Wonder why you can't catch the little bastards, well they can run up to three miles an hour.

Can live without a head for up to a week, then the only they actually die is becasue they can't drink water.

Can survive without food for up to a month.

Nuc the little bastards..... hold your horses, dont be so hasty : A lethal dose of radiation for a human is 800 rems*, the american cockroach is 67,000 rems! and the german coackroach is up to 105,000 rems!!!, Vile.

*A "rem" is the dosage of radiation that will cause a specific, measured amount of injury to human tissue.

So the following morning i moved back into the Semen hotel. There are a few cafes and travel agencies in and around the hotels here with message boards, which are a great way to hook up with other people who are heading the same way as you. I answered a message wanting more people for a day trip to the Taklimakan desert posted by two british students, Alex and Fi who are heading back to the UK via Pakistan after Studying chinese in Beijing. Later that evening i got talking to Ivan an isreali guy, born in South Africa who lives in London!, he was also interested, so the four of us it was.

Ivan, Alex and Fi attracting a crowd of onlookers

The Taklimakan desert is the second largest desert in the world, at 337,600 sq km and at a height of a 1000 meters. The day trip inclded a trip to the desert and and stopping of at a local market in the small town of Shache. After setting of at 6.30 am Uihgur time, now before we go on, there are two times here, Uihgur time and Beijing time (offical time), the Uihgurs basically hate the chinese, so they use the Uihgur time, 2 hours behind Beijing time, which is actually how it should be considering Kashgar is 4000km west of Beijing.

We finally arrived at the desert nearly 5 hours later, we then walked into the desert for a couple of hours which was better than i expected, then on the way back we stopped off at the saturday market, which was a totally new and fantastic experience. The moment we arrived, we were the centre of attention, when ever one of us stopped to look at something or take a picture a croud soon gatherd around and when you turned to walk away you were hemed in and no one would move. My batteries ran out at one point and in the process of changing them, a crowd of around 30 people circled around me, it was unreal, suddenly the sellers were now reduntant and we were the stars of the show.

Lizard, Taklimakan desert

So after all the excitment it was time to leave and head back to Kashgar, another fun filled four hour drive.