Train No 24 from Ulaanbaatar to Beijing left at 7am on 20th August.
We again were lucky with Chinese conductors who with no fuss loaded our bikes onto the train at the end of the carriage - no extra charge (we have heard all sorts of storıies of people not being let on the train or having to pay extra for the bikes)
This time we had a nice Mongolian restaurant to spend our last Mongolian money - yamm!
And so we left the skyline of the capital cıty behind and rolled South.
Like in the TransMongolian from Moscow each cariage has a coal fired water urn so we had a constant supply of piping hot water - nice!
The desert was one big open shrubby nothingness... 
...with a cracking sunset, sandy settlements and gers in the middle of nowhere...
The border crossing - Mongolia/China took quite long. First the controls and then the wheels had to be changed as the wheel gauges in the two countries are different. The entire train was driven into a big hall late at night. Then massive hydraulic jacks lifted the carriages - with us in it - and the old bogies were rolled out from underneath us and replaced with new Chinese ones. All in all we spent 7hours with no toilet -not allowed during border crossing - but it was very interesting.
Beijıng greeted us with rain and a colourful array of umbrellas. We arrived midday and were immediately taken by the place - great for cycling!
Beijıng greeted us with rain and a colourful array of umbrellas. We arrived midday and were immediately taken by the place - great for cycling!
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