More stuff

In the absence of a proper blog post, here's a link to lots of photos we've put up on Flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24785933@N07/

Since Paddy's day we've had a hangover, spent a week in Chengdu playing pool and watching DVDs for a mini-holiday, moved again to Chongqing to all-you-can-drink wine and lots of grime, then on to Hong Kong to renew our visas and go see Macau, the real Vegas apparently. We'll find out tomorrow!

Fiona will be back with a detailed update when there's a lot less neon, , gambling, Irish Bars, dumplings and shoe shops to amuse us.

Merry Paddy's Day!

...to one and all.

This is the "Grand Khaan" Irish Pub in Ulan Bataar, they have nice noodles and excellent Guinness.

The photos bit - Mongolia

I'm going to try and throw some photos up here if this infernal machine stops crashing every couple of minutes.

We're in Ulan Bataar at the moment, great little city. Spent a couple of days in the Terelj national park, visiting vaguely animalistic rocks, horseriding, wandering around in the snow. Back in Ulan Bataar we have 4 days to kill before the train to China. haircuts, Irish pubs, slow interneting and French food help to while away the hours. We're moving away from Siberia at this stage, getting warmer and sunnier, less ice on the ground and a few less layers of thermals.

Seamus was stopped in the street by a lovely older chinese couple who wanted to hire him for a month to teach English for 2 hours a day...i was tempted, apparently they're crying out for native english speakers to teach here, a whole quarter of the city centre is full of english institutes, schools and "talktalkenglish" centres.

Cleaning the manky train at the border with Dave

Yummy salty tea with guide and driver in Terelj

If the wind changes your faces will freeze like that, or could just be the ice

gandan monastery, ulan bataar

fiona tucking into an approximation of a cocktail with my "irish flag" in front at le bistro francais (great spot, charming owner)

All going well we'll be in Beijing by the weekend, meeting Rong and the family in Xi'an the following week, on to Vietnam by the middle of April to find a beach and some sun.