2nd and last day Harbin

At breakfast we met a nice Australian lady and a Swedish guy travelling together. We made friends laughing about the strange looking colour of the liquid they were calling coffee. It wasn't and was sweet. We managed to get a real coffee after asking.

We gave them some tips on where to go on the Trans Manchurian as they were doing our trip in reverse. She also confirmed for me that China have banned Facebook and obviously the blog site as well, so no more updates loaded till South Africa I guess. Bizarre to say the least.
We went back to our room and packed our day packs so that we could leave the main bags at Beijing station when we arrived, and leave them there while we did the Datong, Pingyao trip. We checked out and left our bags at the hotel.
Nearby is a pretty church which has been converted into an art centre.

We walked around a shopping mall to warm up, which sold mostly shoes. My R2000 Colombia boots that are supposed to be rated to minus 50, have been useless, and here were wonderfully padded, simple shoes that everyone was wearing for about R100. (In fairness I to Colombia I later asked someone wearing the Chinese boots if their feet were cold and they said yes, when mine were still warm. Also, I realised my mistake was taking 20 year old socks that soon had holes - I needed thicker ones). I considered buying, but didn't feel like the hassle of carrying an extra pair, so we braved the cold again and walked to Zhaolin Park. The lady at the ticket office confirmed it was only 100 yen anytime of the day and we decided to come back just before it was getting dark so we could experience both. We wandered up to the trendy shopping area called Zhongyang Dajie, where we bought some nice street food, including bits of meat,  something fishy and some  goji berries, which of course were crunchy because they were frozen from being outside. Did I mention it's cold in Harbin!

My toes were going numb again, thanks Colombia, so we found a coffee shop and had some great coffee and a pinenut tart. Warmed up again, we went back to Zhaolin Park to find the price had now doubled. Sigh. As the main tourist attraction of China, why not just put the prices and explanation up in a few foreign languages. We paid anyway and enjoyed the relative quiet of this park compared to last nights crowds.

Back at the hotel we recharged our phones and sent last few emails. As we'd already checked out we were not allowed to use a toilet, really? And Ibis is an international hotel group. We collected our luggage and walked quite a way before catching a taxi. I think he only stopped because he thought we were going to the airport as the trip to the station cost less than R20. Roy got our e-tickets converted to actual ones and although the ticket hall looked crowded he said the man was very helpful. We converted all the tickets, including to Datong, etc.  Now we are waiting in the waiting area 5 for our train.

So everyone started queuing for the train and we joined the crowd. If possible, it felt even colder outside and the ground was very slippery on the tiles. The queue came out at coach 1 and Roy said ours was 24. At first I thought he must be wrong as surely there weren't that many coaches, but by 10 I still couldn't see the end of the train and I joked whether there would be enough time to reach the end. At 11 the coaches started doubling up to my relief, but at the end of the train we'd only reached 19? The crowds had thinned and we were directed back to the other end of the train. Checking along the way a few times, we still were told further back. Eventually we were running, the only passengers left on the platform. When they started blowing the whistle, one of the lady conductors let us on her coach and pointed us further on down. Now on the train, the passages were crowded with people charging their phones and getting acquainted with each other, and here were these stupid Westerners dragging their big bags along behind them, crushing toes while not knowing how to apologise in Mandarin. We were coach 2. The 4 following the number 2 was actually some Mandarin writing which vaguely resembled a 4.
Our fellow travellers, in our coupe were 2 Chinese men from Harbin. The younger one, a student,  studied English in Beijing but has only got written experience, but it's such a pleasure to be able to communicate.
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