Eastward Ho!

This is the introduction to my series From Moscow to Osaka by Land & Sea.

Two months ago I quit my job at the bank. Today I finally set off on my month long adventure of trains, boats and hikes that will take me from sleepy Rufford, Lancashire, North-west England to Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon), South-east Vietnam where I will start my year of teaching maths.

I will be taking the train east from Moscow to Harbin, China with stops in Irkutsk and Chita. I will then turn south and travel to Shanghai via Shenyang, Tianjin and Beijing.

From Shanghai I take a detour to Osaka, Japan by ferry. Then finally I fly from Kansai airport to Ho Chi Minh City. I had intended to not fly at all during this trip but I need to start work earlier than I originally planned so it saves time.

But first I need to go down to London to sort out the last bits of visa admin. Visas have been a real headache over the last two months. I had never applied for a visa before and there are a lot of things I wish I had known. Such as the embassy taking my passport for the time the visa is being processed – this delayed my plans because I had intended to apply for my Russian and Chinese visas at the same time but both require my passport – so I have done them sequentially and lost some time I had hoped to spend in Russia.