Freak Show

Day 12: Yekaterinburg (RUS) – Omsk (RUS). “The people don't look very Asian”, Karen said as we huddled in all our clothing layers and walked along Pr Lenina against the falling snow. It was a fair observation. As the continent's first major town travelling from West to East, Yekaterinburg felt very European. In fact, it felt more European here that it did back in Moscow; many of the signs were printed using the Roman alphabet, a few more people could speak English and the restaurant staff weren't quite so rude!

We had chosen to spend a day here simply to break our long train journey but actually, it was a really nice place. Historically, Yekaterinburg has an infamous past; for this was the place in April 1918 where the Romanov's were imprisoned, tortured and later executed. It was also the focus of world attention again in May 1960 when Gary Power's U2 spy-plane was shot down from an altitude of 68,000 feet just 20 miles south of the town resulting in the collapse of the Summit Conference in Paris. But today, as Russia's fifth largest city, it feels very cosmopolitan, modern and welcoming.

The intense cold limited our sight-seeing activities to blocks of about an hour before seeking refuge in the warmth of a café or shop. But that worked for us as we had to stock up in preparation for our next train journey; a 53 hour marathon that would take us from our current location down to Irkutsk and Lake Baikal. Most of the Trans Siberian Trains are equipped with restaurant cars, but everybody takes a picnic on-board to 'graze' during the long journey. As we wandered around the supermarket, I gazed into our shopping basket and it reminded me very much of when Karen and I were students: Bread, cheese, mushroom soup flavoured crisps, vodka, fizzy fish, nuts, water and the Russian equivalent to 'Pot Noodle'. Bliss!

To add to the confusion of Trans-Siberian travel, all trains in Russia run to Moscow time (rather than local time) and so at 14:34 we boarded the 12:34 train to Irkutsk. Instantly, we became the source of the locals entertainment as we brought our western style 'freak show' to Service 64. I tried to introduce myself to our Russian cabin-mates using a mixture of English, German, diabolical Russian and sign language whilst Karen was getting to know Maryna our cabin attendant: Maryna, determined to collect all of our train tickets - Karen only wanting to offer those tickets for this leg of the journey. Unable to explain their respective points of view, each grabbed a corner of the wallet and fought over it like two dogs would contest a bone. People swarmed into the corridor to watch this entertaining spectacle – Great Fun!

(By the way, I think Maryna's got the 'hots' for me! - She been asking for my email address and showing me glamour photographs of herself! Perhaps it's my new beard that I've been cultivating since leaving Steeple Morden. I think it gives me a certain 'lived in' look!)

Deep Freeze

Day 11: Balyezino (RUS) – Yekaterinburg (RUS). Karen flung her arms around me, “That's one continent done, on to the next!” she exclaimed excitedly. Our fellow passengers in carriage 8 had started to congregate in the corridor long before we reached the white stone obelisk in that marked the continental division. Behind us now, the continent of Europe and our home of Steeple Morden some three and a half thousand miles to the west. Ahead of us, the continent of Asia, which as part of our travelling adventure, we also intended to cover end to end.

The train pushed on, huge plumes of diesel smoke were visible from our carriage window as the locomotive struggled with the changes of elevation as we crossed the low mountains of the Urals. The snow lay deep and crisp and as we advanced towards Yekaterinburg we caught a glimpse of the rudimentary ski-lifts that formed the basis of this town's winter sports activities. “It looks a bit cold for that”, Karen said with a shudder. She was absolutely right – since crossing the Ural's the temperature had plummeted and we were now trying to come to terms with life in the deep freeze.

In common with the rest of our travelling experience we had lessons to learn – and fast! Foolishly, I had disembarked the train with my jacket open and only my inner gloves for warmth. After just 10 minutes of exposure to these temperatures, I started to experience pins-and-needles in my fingers. We made for the warmth of the Metro station; my hands burning and painful. I realised with horror that in just a few minutes, I was starting to suffer from frost bite. My body's natural reaction to the intense cold was to withdraw all of the blood from my extremities in order to maintain the functioning of my vital organs.

After stopping for a hot drink and checking that we were fully layered up we ventured outside again – incredibly cold but this time bearable. Ahead of us an advertising hoarding broadcast the outside temperature: -20 degrees centigrade: colder than the inside of a three star chest freezer – no wonder we were cold!

As with everything in life, there was an upside however to the incredible cold that we were experiencing. In need of warming we stopped by a local bar and ordered a couple of vodka's. Out here they store the Vodka outside, so that it turns syrupy in the extreme cold. And it went down beautifully; smooth, cold, viscous. So well in fact that we had to have another. And another. And...

Zazdorovje! (Cheers!)

Trans Siberian Express

Day 10: Moscow (RUS) – Balyezino (RUS). The snow was falling thick and fast. I cleared the condensation from the carriage window using the sleeve of my jumper and peered out into the gloomy Moscow night. After a couple of minutes a big grin covered my face as I caught a glimpse of what I was looking for: Kilometre marker '1'. It was 38 minutes past midnight and the powerful diesel locomotive that hauled service 44, the Trans-Siberian Express, had just pulled out of Yaroslavsky station.

We had boarded the longest train journey on earth; our destination, Beijing was located at kilometre marker 7,865 – some 5,000 miles down the line and this was to be our goal for the next three weeks.

After the formalities of boarding the train we soon found the cabin that would be our home for the next 36 hours and we were making ourselves at home. This time we had opted for 'kupe' class which was similar to the 'couchette' cars that we used in Europe, only the Russian trains had just 4 berths per compartment rather than 6 giving us a little more personal space.

As the only English speaking people on the train, we were soon causing a lot of interest with the locals – our carriage attendant seemed to burst into fits of giggles every time she saw us (I'm still not sure why!) and so it was not long before we were paid a visit by 'Director of Train' no less; handsomely dressed in a shiny blue shell suit. (Nice!). But after checking through our paper-work he seemed happy enough and went about his business.

The train sped on in a North Easterly direction towards Perm, the most northerly latitude of our entire adventure, rolling through dense forests of pine, birch and oak and crossing two more time zones in the process. According to the locals we spoke to in Moscow, the weather had been exceptionally mild for the time of year – but not so here. Winds blowing directly off the Arctic Tundra, had brought an abundance of snow to these forests and we gazed on in delight at the constantly evolving 'Christmas Card' scene before us; trees and telegraph poles bowing under the weight of a Russian winters snowfall. Stunningly beautiful.

As the light faded and the train continued on its incessant journey into the heart of this enormous country, we engaged in a friendly conversation with Galia; our room-mate for this leg of the journey. Galia could speak no English and we could speak no Russian, but between us we managed to engage in a long and amusing dialogue that was closer to charades than conversation. She told us how she was returning home after visiting her three daughters. Or did she have just the one daughter, but she had been there three times? Or did her one daughter have three cats? I guess we'll never know – good fun none-the-less.

Eventually Galia, produced a book of Sudoku puzzles. Something we could all participate in as equals - the universal language of mathematics. Although, I don't think Karen was too impressed by the symbols used by the Russian authors of the book to depict the difficulty of each puzzle. Easy puzzles were denoted by a picture of a child, intermediate puzzles by a picture of a woman and difficult puzzles by a picture of a man. I said nothing!

Bolt

Day 9: Moscow (RUS). As Anastasiya Yatsenko took her final encores, I had to admit there was a tear in my eye. “It must be awful smoky in here”, I said to Karen, as the house lights came up in the Bolshoi Theatre. She said nothing but gave me a knowing smile as we slowly made our way up the aisle to the exit at the back of the auditorium.

When it comes to art and literature, I'm a bit of a philistine. Don't get me wrong; it's not that I dislike art - it's that to be honest, I don't really understand it. And so ordinarily, give me a choice between going the ballet or going to the football, I'd have my Watford scarf on before you could say “Ah, referee!”. But our travel adventure was about new experiences and as we were in Moscow, home of arguably the best ballet company in the world, performing at arguably the best ballet venue in the world, we simply couldn't miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Moscow had turned up in its finery; black ties, ball gowns, diamonds and tiaras. And then there was Karen and me: Hiking boots, muddy trousers, fleeces and woolly hats – clearly the scruffiest people there – but nobody minded (well we didn't anyway!)

As the spectacle in front of us unfolded I became completely entranced by the powerful combination of music and dance as the State Academy performed Dmitry Shostakovich's Bolt; a ballet in two acts depicting the tale of a disgruntled factory workers plot for industrial sabotage; a theme deemed so controversial in 1930's communist Russia that it was banned after its one opening night performance and remained confined to the text books until re-instated by the Bolshoi in 2005.

The talent, commitment and dedication of the dancers and players shone through in their performance, and even philistines like me were able to grasp what was going on. Karen, did however make me laugh in the final scene when Ivashka's dream conjured up ballerinas on scooters dressed in red flying suits complete with Biggles hats & goggles. “It looks like a highly coordinated version of the Red Barrows!”, she said And she was absolutely right. (Although the only people that would understand that reference are people from Steeple Morden who have seen Shostakovich's ballet. Chris?)

As we made the way out of the Theatre we were reminded of our presence in Moscow by the usual souvenir sellers selling their incredible repertoire of tat: Bolshoi Theatre snowstorms, ballet shoe fridge magnets; Swan Lake tea cosies – they had the lot.

As we made our way to the Metro station, Karen and I reflected on the wonderful evening we had spent and we contemplated our next ballet. Maybe, just maybe, I did have that 'culture gene' after all.

Local Knowledge

Day 8: Moscow (RUS). “Thanks, Sergie. we feel a lot better now”, I said as we shook hands and made our goodbyes. Karen and I made our way down the narrow corridor of 20a Novoalekseevskaya Street, through security and back out to the main street.

Our stay in Moscow had taught us the importance of seeking local help to enrich our travel experience, whether that be from our new found chums in the hostel, Moscowvites that we met during our stay, or 'friends of friends' that everybody has across the world. We didn't need to try do everything alone - in fact, the truth was, we couldn't do it all on our own.

And so , when we became concerned about the our visa registration we opted to make the short trip to the Alecseevskaya area of Moscow to pay a visit on our friends at Real Russia. It is a legal requirement in Russia that if you stay in the same location for more than 72 hours you have to register your movements with the State Police. We had been in the city for more than two days and hadn't got around to this. Also, to make matters worse, when we entered Russia from Belarus nobody had stamped our passports which added to our anxiety's. 20 minutes with Sergie, though and everything was sorted. All the paperwork in order, everything legal, everything explained.

As we left the offices, Sergie enquired about our plans for the day and he insisted that as we were in Alecseevskaya we must pay a visit to the All Russia Exhibition Centre . Off of the main tourist map, this was fascinating place. Originally created in the 1930's to show everyone the success of the Soviet economic system - glorifying every aspect of socialist construction from education and health to agriculture, technology, science and food. We found the Armenian pavilion particularly inviting but that was probably due to the availability of their excellent local brandy that we just had to sample (it would have been rude not to!)

Our confidence in navigating Moscow had increased immensely and by the afternoon we were hopping onto monorails, off trolleybuses and onto the metro with relative ease – a very different picture than when we arrived in this alien city just a few days ago.

It wasn't all plain sailing though. At dinner, in my constant battle to get to grips with the Russian language and with my clumsy understanding of Cyrillic, I ended up with a plate of Pigs Snout with Boiled Cabbage. Tasty!

Dare

Day 7: Moscow (RUS).

Take a lift to the top of the Empire State,
Take a drive across the Golden Gate,
March, march, march across Red Square,
Do all the things you've ever dared.
These are the things, These are the things:
The things that dreams are made of.

If you recognise those lyrics, chances are you are as old as I am and have a similar taste in dodgy music! I remember buying the Human League album 'Dare' as a spotty adolescent back in 1981 and being inspired by the words and Phil Oakey's delivery of 'The Things That Dreams are Made of'. I remember thinking, “Yeah, I'm going to do all of that”.

Well it's took me a long time, but today, after almost 30 years, I finally achieved that boyhood dream. Karen and I visited New York back in 2000 as part of a long weekend away to cerebrate her 30th birthday, and as part of the usual tourist route we ascended America's most famous skyscraper. The following year we did a tour of the West Coast on one of our most memorable holidays and on the way down from the Napa Valley to LA we we drove over that iconic bridge. On this day, as flurry's of snow blew in the cold Russian air Karen and I walked the across the open expanse between Pokovshy Cathedral and the Lenin Mausoleum and I finally completed the set by marching across Moscow's famous square.

Moscow is an amazing place – not what I was expect ting – but amazing non-the-less. In fact, as we wandered around the wide boulevards, I found it hard to image that this city was ever communist! The chauffeur driven Rolls Royces's and Maybach's portrayed the cities affluence, the top class Sushi restaurants and expensive coffee shops characterised the cities 'chic' and the array of designer brand shops along every high street depicted the city as truly international.

The Kremlin, also, was not what we expected. To me the Kremlin was a building – like the White House, but it is actually the entire old city consisting of government buildings, churches, cathedrals and museums. And believe me it is stunning! The architecture, the paintings and the artefacts exhaust superlatives within minutes. And when we stumbled upon a choir of Orthodox monks delivering praise to God in Russian A Cappella, it sent shudders down our spines. On it's own, worth the 2,000 mile journey.

Day 7: Total Mileage to Date: 2,377: Number of Time Zones Crossed: 4; Number of Countries Visited: 6; Number of Transport Modes Used: 7.

Bogies

Day 6: Minsk (BY) – Moscow (RUS). “K, curly Y, Triangle, backwards R...”, I recited to Karen. If you overheard us you would have thought we were playing some weird image association game, but no, we were actually trying to navigate the Moscow Metro!

Having left 'familiar' languages based on the Roman character set behind some days ago we were trying to make sense of a whole new language based on Cyrillic characters. Sure, we had a map, but the guide book had 'very kindly' translated everything into words that us Westerners could pronounce – and that is not what is displayed in the stations or on the streets!

But eventually we made it to our little hostel (aptly named the 'Trans Siberian') in the Kurskaya district of North East Moscow which would be our home for the next few days. The hostel was a simple affair, but it was clean and had everything we needed. The host, Dima, was extremely helpful and made us feels at home instantly, providing us with some great information on how to make the most of our stay in the capital of the Russian Federation.

Following the stresses of the previous days travel, the journey from Minsk was perfect in every way. Our nine hours on the train passed without incident and we got a perfect nights sleep in our little cabin of the Moscow Railways train. For this leg of the journey, the only occupants of the cabin were Karen and me which meant that we didn't even have to engage in the customary game of 'Twister' every time anybody wanted to get their toothbrush out of their luggage or scratch their right elbow!

As a bit of a closet 'geek', my personal journey highlight was witnessing the engineering solution to handling multi gauge tracks over this gargantuan railway journey: On the Belarusian border the railway gauge (the width of the track) changes from 1.4 to 1.5 meters. But rather than changing trains, the railway authorities simply hoisted the carriages lock, stock and barrel into the air and then deposited them on a new set of bogies compatible with the new railway network. And all of this happened without any of the passengers even having to leave the train. Fascinating! (Hello! Is anybody still awake?)

Naivety

Day 5: Warsaw (PL) – Minsk (BY). “I am going to write a very strong letter of complaint to Polska EuroLines”, Karen said tongue in cheek as she walked towards the taxi rank. I said nothing as I lugged my rucksack back on to my shoulder and blew on my hands to keep the night's cold at bay.

We had always intended the first few days of our adventure to be a 'trial run' for both our abilities and our sentiment for travelling before we reached the 'hard core' demands of Central Asia. And tonight, as part of our initiation, we learnt a very big lesson: Back home we assume all systems work and then we complain if they don''t. Out here, we now knew that you had to assume that nothing works and then if it does you can celebrate!

We had booked a bus to take from Warsaw to Minsk, departing at midnight from the bus station. Simple enough? Well yes, until we tried to find bus at the bus station! We arrived with about half an hour to spare only to realise that the bus details weren't posted anywhere. We then tried to seek help only to be defeated by the language barrier exacerbated by the fact there seemed to be (at least) three Minsk's; one in Poland, one in Belarus and one in the Ukraine – all apparently served by this bus station!

The security staff locked the bus station buildings shortly after we arrived leaving us (and a number of other people who seemed to be having similar problems) to stand out in the cold and wait. And wait! After we had given the bus company the benefit of the doubt for a further hour we decided to cut our losses and find a hotel for the night concluding that a) we were in the wrong place b) the bus had broken down and nobody had informed the bus station or c) the service we had booked was actually 'discretionary' depending on the mood of the driver!

At the crack of dawn we awoke and camped out at the train station information office to see if we could find an alternative route to Belarus. At first it appeared as if we were out of luck, with none of the available trains making it in time for our onward connection to Russia. But fortunately for us, one particularly diligent member of the ticketing staff realised that if we took the service train to Lukow we would just be in time to catch the sleeper train coming up from Hungary getting us into Belarus in the early evening.

The next problem we had was that the service train left in half an hour. We had to get back to the hotel, pack, check out, get to the train station and have breakfast in just 30 minutes. It was very tight but we just made it.

So for Karen and I, some important lessons learned and some great experience to help us in the next round of our travelling adventure. More importantly though, we had made it through our first set-back: We were still smiling and miraculously, still talking to each other!

All in all, this naivety had cost us about £300 in un-budgeted hotels & alternative travel arrangements, had lessened our available time in Minsk and had caused the loss of a pair of my underpants in the haste to check out of our hotel. The money was a concern to us as we had a strict budget but it was still early days in the adventure and we believed we could pull the deficit back – so our diet in Russia needed to be more aligned to Potato Stew rather than Potato Supreme! In term of Minsk, well we had to live with that – the guide books were fairly non committal about the city anyway. My pants on the other hand was a different matter. I only started with 5 pairs and now after just 5 days I was down to 4 pairs. If our adventure continued like this, I would be going commando by the time we reached Siberia. And it's bloody cold there!

No Swimwear

Day 4: Krakow (PL) – Warsaw (PL). We are amazing. No, no – not Karen and I – I mean our species: Homo Sapiens. In a relatively short (geological) time frame, we have achieved an extraordinary amount. We have learned to control and manage our own food supply, we have developed a diverse array of art & literature, we have eradicated the causes of many fevers and morbidities and we have even put a man on the moon.

But as a species we are also capable of the most atrocious evil. Last year on a motorcycle tour of South West France, Karen and I visited Oradour-sur-Glane, the scene in 1945 of the systematic genocide of 600 innocent men, women and children in revenge for the Vichy resistance as the Nazi's fled Europe. This year, as part of our travels, we visited Auschwitz – the scene of possibly mankind's darkest hour.

The weather matched the venue; it was cold, damp and flurries of snow lay on the ground. In emotional silence, Karen and I poignantly wandered the deserted camp courtyard and read stories of the camps infamous occupants – some sickeningly saddening, others brave and heroic. The camp remains as a reminder to humanity that we must never do this again.

As we came to leave the camp, Karen and I were in need of a mood lifter. This came courtesy of some odd signs telling you what you can and can't do at the Auschwitz Museum. Some of them were obvious and self evident; No Talking. No photography. No music. The one that made us chuckle was the sign that said No Swimwear. And by the fact Polish authorities deemed it necessary to publish such a sign, I am guessing that this was a serious problem at Auschwitz. It made me think of some surreal conversations that may have happened in Polish households, “Would you like to go the Auschwitz museum today, dear?”. “Yes, OK. Should I wear my solemn black overcoat or my polka dot bikini and take my beach ball?”

We climbed back into the Fiat Panda and headed North on our long 250 mile journey to Warsaw where we planned to pick up the midnight bus that would take us from Poland to the Belarusian capital of Minsk.

Uncharted Territory

Day 3: Somewhere in Northern Germany (D) – Krakow (PL). Karen and I had our noses pressed onto the dirty glass of the number 510 bus that was taking us from the railway station to the car rental offices. We were keen to take in as much as possible of our new surroundings as this was the first of many countries that neither Karen or I had been to before. The truth was though it wasn't particularly exciting here; a lot of grey buildings dating from the 1960's, the occasional shopping mall dating from the 1990's and here and there piles of snow that the wind had blown together.

So we intended to drive south to the stunning medieval town of Krakow. Making progress on the Polish roads was difficult however; one moment you were driving on nice new tarmac funded by the EU, the next you were back on rutted and potholed streets – the result of years of Cold-War neglect. And then, of course, there was 'Road Chicken' which seemed very popular with the local drivers. This basically involved suicidal overtaking manoeuvre whereby the local driver headed straight for us and the last one to take evasive action won the round. I have to be honest, they beat us hands down every time!

The snow was starting to fall heavy on the S7 as afternoon turned to dusk. The needle on the speedometer nudged 120 and then 130 kilometres per hour. “We need to get to Krakow before dark” I said. “You're missing the point.”, Karen replied with a smile. She continued “This is not one of our break-neck holidays. This is about travelling. This is about experiencing. We don't need to do anything”. Of course she was right. I still had a lot to learn about making this into a travelling experience rather than just another holiday.

We faired much better at dinner however. Having made it to the remarkable city of Krakow and having spent a delightful evening wandering about the Stare Miasto we then retreated to the back streets; away from the tourist haunts and where prices were much more reasonable. In fact, we found a great little tavern whereby we both had a home cooked meal with local beers for 45 Polish Zloty (about £10). Last night in Amsterdam, the same meal would have cost us about 45 Euro's (about £45!)

That was one aspect of Western Europe that neither Karen or I would miss!

Sleeper Car

Day 2: Somewhere in the North Sea (GB) to Somewhere in Northern Germany (D). I don't know what it is, but I have a certain affinity with Amsterdam. Maybe it's the classic architecture, the scenic canals, the stately mansions from the Golden Age or maybe it's the coffee shops, the smell of shishka or the ladies of the city. I don''t know – but I do like Amsterdam.

Karen and I arrived there about at about 10.30am and after a typical Dutch street breakfast we spent a wonderful day wandering around the streets and taking in the sights of this beautiful city on a cold but bright winter's day.

By early evening we were exhausted and we were looking forward the the next leg of our journey – new experiences for both of us: Our first time sleeping on a train (although it would be the first of many!) and, at 15 hours, the longest train journey that we had ever embarked on (although this was to be eclipsed by journeys later in our travels!), According to time-table, The DeutcheBahn train pulled out of platforrm 11b of Amsterdam Centraal at preciously 19:01 on its long journey across the Eurasian continent to Moscow. We however, would only be staying with train 447 until it reached central Poland.

We had been allocated bunks 83 and 85 in a 6 seater 'couchette'. By the time we had found our cabin, two of our room mates were already busy finding space for their belongings. Marek and Natelia were both from Northern Poland and were returning home having attended a conference in Holland on Zen meditation. Fortunately for us, they were both very kind and helped us to make the most of our journey in our confined space. Each couchette, measured approximately 7 ft by 7 ft and had 6 bunk beds arranged on either side of the cabin up to the 8ft height of the compartment. Whilst the couchette was comfortable, its size and lack of available luggage space meant that every movement we made needed the coordinated agreement and understanding of the rest of our travellers. It reminded me very much of a human version of that puzzle where you have to arrange the tiles, one at a time, in the right order. Still it helped to break the ice!

We went to bed at about 9pm and a combination of the days exertions coupled with the gentle rocking motion of the train soon had me fast asleep. It was however a broken sleep. At about midnight, as we arrived in Cologne, I was awoken by the arrival of two further passengers to our compartment, one of which had enough luggage for five people which she piled up next to my bunk to the extent I couldn't even get out of bed! Then later still we reached Berlin and I was awoken by the sound of trains de-coupling and coupling as our transport was split in to three, one segment bound for Copenhagen, another bound for Prague and then our section bound for Poland.

All in all, an interesting experience. And one we were definitely looking forward to repeating as our holiday progressed.

First Steps

Day 1: Steeple Morden – Somewhere in the North Sea. I think it was Mao Tse-tung who said “A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step”. Which in many ways seemed quite apt as we had decided to walk the first leg of the journey. The only difference was that Mao's journey was 1,000 miles, whereas ours was nearer 12,000 miles.

After a final excursions to the Waggon & Horses for a final farewell drink with Steve, Karen and I donned our ruck-sacks and set off on the short 3 mile walk to the country station of Ashwell & Morden over those delightful country paths that brought us to Steeple Morden in the first place.

It was a great relief to be finally on our way. The last few weeks had been an emotional roller-coaster for Karen and me as we had been completely over-whelmed by the warmth and sincerity offered by our close friends and relatives as we kissed and hugged our goodbyes. Even the first leg of our journey wasn't without emotion, with Ange insisting on taking our picture outside of the church as she offered us one last embrace. John, the chairman of the Church Friends shook our hand as we passed St Peter & St Paul's and Sue from the Parish Council waved her goodbyes as we walked down the side of John Jarman's farm.

It took us an hour with our backpacks to walk that first leg of the journey, but soon we were aboard the 16:04 to Cambridge. At the station, we took a short bus ride in to Cambridge City Centre for a spot of dinner and people watching. How strange it felt sitting in All Bar One, mingling with the commuters as they filed out of their office buildings whilst we were there on our way to Bangkok.

At 19:43 we boarded the Dutch Flyer, which whisked across East Anglia from Cambridge to Harwich where we boarded the Stena Line Ferry that took us to the Hoek van Holland, and then onwards to Amsterdam via Rotterdam using the Dutch National Railway system.

Not a bad start then. Day 1: Total Mileage to Date: 150: Number of Time Zones Crossed: 2; Number of Countries Visited: 1; Number of Transport Modes Used: 4.

We were on our way.

Packing

One of the most frequent questions that we were asked since we decided to embark on our travels was “How do you pack for such a long journey?”

Surprisingly, that aspect of our trip was quite straightforward. We decided all of the things that we thought we would need and then discarded half of them! And the discipline for travelling light is self enforcing: If you take it - you have to carry it – and that would probably mean entire days of hiking with all of our possessions strapped to our back.

With hindsight the mistake I made was to buy a rucksack with too much capacity. I was advised to opt for a 70 litre pack but in true male testosterone fuelled fashion, I decided that I needed a bigger one and bought a 90 litre pack: Consequently, I had more space than I needed and had to keep resisting the temptation to 'pack another sweater, just in case the two I had weren't warm enough' or 'pack another pair of socks just in case we got invited to a party where all the men had to wear yellow football socks'. Unlikely.

So after just two hours we were ready to go: Our packing list was as follows:

Essentials: 3 t-shirts, 3 tops, walking trousers, jeans, trainers, flip flops, walking boots, 2 pairs thermal underwear, waterproof coat, waterproof trousers, 5 pairs pants, 5 pairs socks, fleece, beanie, compass, camera, sun protection, toiletries (must haves only, so Karen's glittery eye make up went back in the cupboard!! ), sleeping bag, stuff sack pillow, first-aid kit, tickets, passports, visas, & money

Luxuries: Swiss army knife (my favourite thing!), sunglasses, torch, cutlery (titanium no less!), pack of cards, bandanna, notebook computer (so that we can blog en-route), mobile phones, reading books, travel guides, travel scrabble (thanks Alison!) & gifts for the people we meet on our travels (whisky and chocolates).

Hopes & Fears

The skiing in Val d'Isere was without the doubt the best that we had ever encountered: An excellent covering of powder white snow, well groomed pistes, fantastic weather and a complete lack of people on the slopes to share that fantastic experience with!

After the intensity of Christmas, the New Year festivities, finishing our jobs and getting ready for our adventure, it felt really good to finally relax and to start to enjoy our gap year experience. The solitude of the mountains, the fresh air and the intoxicating effect of the local toffee vodka gave Karen and I time to reflect on our emotions for the journey which we were about to embark on.

We chatted enthusiastically about our forthcoming travels: “What will Mongolia really be like?”, Karen questioned, “I just don't know what to expect”. She continued, “The cold of Siberia, the warmth of Thailand. The scenery of Vietnam, the people of Cambodia, the food in China. This really will be an amazing adventure.” But amongst the hopes we also had our apprehensions. How would we get on with Russian bureaucracy? Would we mange the biting cold of a Mongolian winter? What about the language difficulties? Was our budget sufficient for the duration? Only time would tell.

Time out on the slopes also re-energised the gremlins in my mind: Were we doing the right thing? Would I be able to get a job on my return, as the UK economy appeared to be going into meltdown? Would the cats be OK? What about our friends and relatives? My mechanism for coping with these negatives thoughts however was to hum the tune of a Lee-ann Womack song as I skied down the isolated pistes. We had been introduced to the music of Womack whilst in the United States for our wedding back in the year 2000. From then on we were both hooked with her music and had accumulated a number of her albums across the years. The inspirational song “I Hope You Dance”, contained the lyrics that described what Karen and I wanted to do with the rest of our lives, and it was those words that helped me right now:

I hope you never fear those mountains in the distance
Never settle for the path of least resistance
Living might mean taking chances, but they're worth taking
Lovin' might be a mistake, but it's worth making

And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance - I hope you dance

This year, Karen and I would dance.

Party

Whether you’re eager or reluctant, one of the best things about leaving anywhere is the party that accompanies the event. Tonight was no exception.

The village pub was the venue, “David & Karen’s Leaving Drinks & Pizza” was the celebration and our closest friends from Steeple Morden were to be our guests. And how wonderful it was to see so many of those friends there to wish us ‘bon voyage’ on this bitterly cold January evening: Alison & Steve of course – our likeminded friends who had moved to the village to improve their quality of life; Andy & Ange - our skiing partners for Val d’Isere; Helen - who would be living at our house and looking after our cats whilst we were away on our travels; Steve & Clare; Fraser, Alison, Eleanor & Lucy; Vicky & Simon; Peter & Chris; Andy and Jane. “Raise a glass”, Karen toasted, “to our absent friends: Becky in Fontainebleau; Susan in Cyprus; Sandra & Alan in Mirabel and Dave & Linda, who are tucked up in bed suffering from that awful flu bug that is going around”. We raised our glasses and drank.

That the venue was the Waggon & Horses was fitting in many ways – after all it was in this very pub, just 7 months ago that Karen and I had hatched our travel plans over a fabulous Sunday Lunch. As I reflected, it occurred to me that the one thing that neither Karen nor I had considered was how we would be feeling tonight. For the past 6 years we had procrastinated over our travel plans; always finding reasons ‘not to do it right now’. Eventually, we had narrowed our concerns down to one – our cats: Huffkin and Chudleigh – but with Helen living at our house and Alison & Steve taking care of everything else, even that objection had melted away.

However, tonight, we realised that we had forgotten to put “How much we will miss our close friends” on to that list of concerns. The truth was, for the majority of those six years, it probably wasn’t an issue to us. But since we moved to Steeple Morden things had changed: In this idyllic village we had been lucky enough to meet some of the nicest people you could every hope to meet and as a consequence, in a relatively short period of time, we had forged some of the strongest friendships that Karen and I had ever had. And tonight it dawned on me – we were going to miss these people immensely!

So with a tear in my eye and a lump in my throat, I hugged our friends goodbye as the evening came to a close and I pondered for a moment, ‘are we doing the right thing’. Absolutely. The great thing about our friends in Steeple Morden is that they are true friends. Whether we were to go away for a week, a month or a year we would return and resume our friendship as if we had never been away.

Karen and I stayed behind at the pub when everybody had left to reflect on our fabulous evening. We drank and toasted “True Friends”.