Articles from this Category
28 October 2024
Today Endy picked me up around 0800 for a bicycle ride around the Marina Bay area. We parked underground at the Gardens by the Bay before cycling west or inland towards the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and the Merlion. We finished by crossing the barrage to the Bay East Garden where a memorial to the […]
28 October 2024
With my body clock on New Zealand time, I woke up early and my host, Wen took me out for a little exploration. The southern tip of Singapore is all new to me. First up, we drove up to Kent Ridge Park for a view of the port area. While the port looked busy and […]
11 August 2024
Train to Urumqi I walked to Hami’s railway station around 0900 after breakfast in my room. I didn’t have to wait long before the queues formed for boarding the train to Urumqi. Departing at 1010, time went quickly as I attended to online chores on my phone. I chose to arrive at Urumqi South where […]
10 August 2024
Hami’s sights are concentrated all in one place in the south-west of the city which I reached by taxi. Kings’ Mansion I lined up to buy the ticket for the Mansion (or palace) of the Hami Kings just before it opened at 1000. Like my old guidebook said, it is a bad recreation of the […]
9 August 2024
Flying to Urumqi I had the alarm for 0445, time for a pre-arranged pick-up at 0530 by a taxi. It was a fixed rate arrangement, with probably a 50% premium, as I was worried that taxis may not be available at this ungodly time, especially when people consider 0530 to be 0330. Waiting on the […]
8 August 2024
What I’m not doing I’ve done most of the things I can do in Hotan. There were a couple that I decided against doing: Mazar of Imam Asim: This mausoleum lies out of town and Uyghurs used to pray here. More recent reports have suggested that the area is off-limits to foreigners. Yue Tu Gan […]
7 August 2024
Train to Hotan I took a taxi for Kargilik station at 0815 for my 0919 train to Hotan. At the security checkpoint for the station, they had trouble summoning a cop and I had to wait about 20 mins. When boarding came, I noticed they had trouble locating my train booking at the turnstiles. I […]
6 August 2024
Train to Kargilik After one night, I’m on the move by train again, this time to Kargilik (Yecheng). I left the hotel at 0715 by taxi for the 0819 train. This time it is only a 50 ride in the hard seat class. With locals observing a 2h unofficial time difference, this ride is bloody […]
5 August 2024
To Yarkant by train Today I do my first of five train trips that I’ve booked, the first of which is from Kashgar to Yarkant (Shache), a journey of 2h20 starting at 0950. I didn’t get to have the hotel breakfast with this early start, which is unofficially 0750 locally. In fact, it was the […]
4 August 2024
Animal market After a day of attending to online matters and cleaning my shoes yesterday, I have what might be the highlight of my Kashgar visit this morning. Being Sunday, I was keen to revisit the animal market to compare what might have changed since 1998. Coming along for the ride was Simon from Switzerland […]