Day 426 - The finale province of the China Mission

We woke up with only 3 more hours until our train arrived in Urumqi, the capital city of Xinjiang province - where the majority of the Uighur nationality live. The views from the train of the surrounding mountains were awesome - they kind of reminded us of home! As soon as we arrived we directly headed to the Kazakhstan Consulate where we applied for our visas - when we arrived it was a nice surprise to be ushered past the whole line of waiting Chinese and inside!! We filled out the usual forms, and just have to wait a couple of days to see if we're allowed into their country or not - at the moment we're not even considering what will happen if we don't get visas!!

Afterwards we were once again treated to the complete and utter friendliness of the Chinese people when we had multiple people trying to help us find a bus to a hostel. The first lady we asked accompanied us 10 minutes down the road to where she thought the bus was, and then halfway back, when more people tried their best to help us. We eventually got on a bus accompanied by a teenage guy who told us when to get off.

One strange thing that happened on the bus (and had actually happened on the train too) was that the conductor asked to search our bags - we didn't find out until later that this was not only due to heightened security for the Olympics, but also because of the bomb attack in Kashgar (also in Xinjiang Province).

We ended off getting off the bus at the completely wrong end of the street, and walking around for over an hour to find the Maitian Youth Hostel - but we're glad we persevered as the hostel is great, with super helpful and friendly staff.

We set off in search of cheap food, and then went for a huge mission to try and find a lonely planet guide for Central Asia, and although we found Chinese versions, there were no English copies anywhere! With this failed mission, we headed to the only foreign owned bar in Urumqi with the hope of getting some info there. After a nice stroll through the People's Park, we eventually found Fubar, and spoke to the Kiwi owner, Johnathon, who is from Wellington!! It was cool checking out the kiwi paraphernalia on the walls including cool retro tea-towels sporting the All Blacks doing the haka along with the classic cartoon kiwi!

Back at the hostel we chatted to our Hong Kong room mates for a few hours, and Adam popped out for some chuanr and beer - being that this province is THE province for chunar (bbq) and it is a favourite of Adam's - especially with a bing de pijiu, which he can order all by himself!!

Adlibing it one step closer to freedom!