Sometimes in the past weeks, I hat certain doubts as to whether traveling like Phileas Fogg (the main character from “Around the World in Eighty Days” by Jules Verne) is possible in our days. Although I do not plan to go around the world, I want to go to China by train
Blue = Around the World in 80 Days, Red = my plan for the summer (approximate, especially Transsiberian; way back from Moscow still missing); Image license: Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0, thanks to Wikipedia User Roke
.
Compared to going by plane, this makes for a few extra bureaucratic difficulties: you need to get visas for many countries you pass through; Luckily, going through the countries of the EU, namely England, Belgium, Germany and Poland, will not be a problem at all, but I do need visas for Belarus, Russia, Mongolia and my final destination, China. Quite a few times, I feared logistic restrictions would prevent this from happening, but I now have all but one visa and hope this will go through fine (thanks to RealRussia providing excellent services in both acquiring visas and getting Russian train tickets).
Especially on my way through Russia, where I am going to stop in Moscow and St. Petersburg, I would be interested in meeting people, but also in China. Here is my travel plan, if you are in any of these places at the same time, get in touch:
(2.7.2010 Starting in Berlin)
3.7. arrive in Moscow (evening)
3.-6.7. Stay in Moscow
6.7.-12.7. Transsiberian-Transmongolian railway Moscow to Beijing
12.7.-13.8. In Beijing doing a Language Course with Live the Language
13.-18.8. (a few days without specific plans yet, maybe for traveling in China)
18.8.-5.9. In Linyi, teaching about Solitons at a Mathematics Summer School