6 July 2018, Friday

I woke up today feeling much better than I did yesterday. The medicine had worked after all. As arranged with my hostel, my driver showed up bright and early at Zaya Guest House and sent me to the Ulaanbaatar railway station, located about 2.5km away. I arrived at 6:50am, well ahead of my 7:30am departure.

I had booked my train ticket from a company called Mongolia Train Tickets (click here). The ticket from Ulaanbaatar to Beijing cost US$160 (S$209.92). From November to the end of May, a direct train from UB to Beijing runs every Thursday and Sunday, but from June to October, there is an additional train that departs on Friday. That’s the one I’m catching today – train service number 24.

The distance from UB to Beijing is about 1,500km and the journey will take 31 hours 5 minutes. That means I will be spending the night on the train. It was not a problem for me because I had already been on the Trans-Mongolian Railway prior to this and I had survived four nights on the train – without showering, no less.

Train number 24 was already on the platform when I arrived. It was a Chinese train and it was painted in the familiar deep green colour with two bright yellow stripes. I presented my ticket to the attendant for inspection and made my way to my Second Class, 4-berth cabin.

The train attendants were all Chinese males, unlike the Trans-Mongolian train I had taken a few days earlier, where the attendants were all female Mongolians. The gents’ uniforms were also not as smart as those worn by the Mongolian ladies, who were always impeccably dressed and conducted themselves in a dignified and disciplined manner.

The cabin was quite similar to the Trans-Mongolian train, except that the bed here was slightly wider, and the upper beds were not retractable. It was certainly spacious enough. I liked that there were two power sockets in the cabin, compared to only one for the Trans-Mongolian train. However, I noticed that this train wasn’t as clean as the Trans-Mongolian one. It wasn’t dirty though, just a bit dusty.

Likewise, a pillow, blanket and bedsheets were provided. The pillow here was better than the Trans-Mongolian one in terms of firmness, but all the four pillows in my cabin looked a bit dirty with stains. Since I was the first on board, I picked the best available one. The bed linen was also creased and not pressed as smartly as the Trans-Mongolian one.

I’m not really nitpicking but just giving you a comparison of the two trains based on my personal experience and observations. Anyway, I’m only on this train for one night so it is bearable. In the end, I didn’t have to share my cabin with anyone so again, it felt like First Class comfort at Second Class prices. 

At 7:30am, we departed UB. There was a nice view of the outskirts shortly after leaving the railway station. The sprawling land was filled with thousands of small houses and gers. I’ve read that the air quality in UB can get really bad during winter with the burning of coal to keep warm, but it was a fine summer’s day today and I could see the mountains in the distance.

Just like the Trans-Mongolian Railway journey, I quickly settled into my cabin and eased into my routine, which was mostly just relaxing, staring out the window and reading a book. At about 11:20am, we made our first stop at Choyr, where we had a 15-minute break.

After departing from Choyr, I went to the restaurant car to have lunch. Unlike the Russian restaurant car that was attached to the Trans-Mongolian train, the one here was a Mongolian restaurant car. Its décor comprised of elaborate wood carvings and the backrests of the seats were lined with rugs of Oriental motifs. The menu wasn’t as extensive and many of the items were not available. I ordered a plate of egg fried rice (MNT 3,500/S$1.93) and a cup of tea (MNT 1,500/S$0.83). The food tasted quite good, mainly because it’s hard to go wrong with a simple dish like egg fried rice.

After lunch, I went back to my cabin and worked on my blog posts. After I got bored of writing, I decided to engage my neighbours. They were Lawrence and Giulia, a Swiss and German couple. They were friendly enough so I invited them into my cabin and had a chat with them.

It was a lovely conversation as we talked about environmental issues and I shared a bit about Singapore’s history, law and politics. I also gave them a mini Chinese lesson by teaching them how to pronounce some common phrases using hanyu pinyin. Hope that will come in handy during their stay in China!

At 5:40pm, I went to the restaurant car again to have an early dinner. Based on my Trans-Mongolian experience, I knew I had to come early before the restaurant car closes as we approach the border at 6:50pm. I ordered a dish of rice with egg, beef and vegetables (MNT 11,700/S$6.44) and a cup of green tea (MNT 2,000/S$1.10), using up all my Mongolian Thugriks in the process, as I didn’t need them anymore. The currency is practically worthless outside the country as you won’t be able to exchange them for local currency anywhere else.

We reached the Mongolian border, Dzamyn Ude, at 7:00pm. Immigration officers came on board and collected our passports while we waited on the train. Note that the washrooms are closed (locked) during this time, so if you need to, make sure you use the toilet at least 20 minutes before arriving at the border.

I later learned that this is because the waste that goes down the toilet bowl on these trains get flushed out onto the tracks. Therefore, the toilets are closed in order to minimise human waste pollution at the border stations, which are places with more inhabitants. We got our passports back at 8:19pm and the train moved off again at 8:35pm.

We soon arrived at the Chinese border, Erlian, at 8:48pm. Chinese officials came on board for preliminary checks, and the train moved off again. At 9:00pm, we arrived at the Customs building. We left our big luggage on the train and only brought down with us our valuables and passports. We cleared immigration pretty quickly and were then ushered to a big waiting hall. Here, we will spend a long time waiting – more than three hours, in fact. Therefore, it is wise for you to bring along some snacks, a power bank for your mobile phone and perhaps some books or things to keep you engaged during the long wait.

The reason for the long waiting time at Erlian is because of the bogie exchange. Mongolia and China use different railway track gauges. Mongolia (and Russia) use a wider gauge of 1,520mm while China uses a standard gauge of 1,435mm, so the bogie on each carriage has to be removed and replaced with a different set. The bogie is the chassis that carries the wheelset attached to the carriage, and this process is called bogie exchange. In simple terms, it means that the entire train is getting a new set of wheels. You can imagine it takes a long time to change the bogies of all 16 or so carriages on the train.

Finally, at 12:37am on 7 July 2018, after what seemed like an interminable wait, the staff informed us that we could return to the train. I was so happy to hear the news because I was very tired by then. I curled into my bed as soon as I returned to my cabin, switched off the lights and went to sleep. It wasn’t an eventful day because of the travelling, but I’m glad I had the chance to rest and recover before arriving in Beijing.