We are finally done with the first part of our China/Russia trip and are now in Vladivostok. We started the trip in Shanghai where we flew from SFO via Beijing. After a day in Shanghai we caught a train to Nanjing, the “Southern Capital” that had a lot of interesting historical stuff (about 4 hours), we then retraced the same route back stopping in Suzhou – a “small town” of 4,5 million people with tons of beautiful garden. We made a side-trip to Tongli, a small watertown, before heading back to Shanghai. After two more days in Shanghai we flew to Beijing, spent a few days there, then flew to Harbin in the north of China. From Harbin we took a train to Suifenhe on the border with Russia and the caught a bus across the border to Vladivostok.

It’s been a long way of getting home for me, and quite a change of perspective. Once upon a time there were nearly direct flights from SFO to Vladivostok, which made it feel like one of “world cities”. Now there are only a few left, which are all amazingly overpriced (a 2 hour flight from Seoul costs around US$800), and it actually turned out flying to Harbin and then taking a train and bus was the cheapest way to get to Vladivostok from SFO. (Of course, saving money wasn’t the only motivation for taking the detour – we've been wanting to visit China for a while. And of course we spent all the money that we saved and more while touring China.) But the point is that instead of seeming like a world city, Vladivostok feels like a remote place somewhere off the northern end of China, which is already in the middle of nowhere. All in all, it was truly an Odysseyan homecoming experience.

We are planing to stay in Vladivostok for three weeks, then get back on the bus and train to Harbin, fly back to Beijing, then back to SFO. The 1000 pictures of China (and maybe some of Vladivostok) will hopefully all get uploaded before we head back.