After that first "sacrificial trip" to the train station, I was able to purchase our tickets to Chengdu on ONLY my second attempt.  Yeah, pretty amazing.  Next Friday we’ll be taking the 24-hour train trip to the south.  The train will head east from Xining to Lanzhou in the Gansu province and then south through Gansu into the Sichuan province to Chengdu.  This is a route I haven’t taken yet so I’m excited to see some new scenery.  Hopefully the weather will be good.

Speaking of routes, Christa and I have been playing a fun board game lately which involves building train routes across a country.  It’s called, Ticket to Ride.  We’ve been playing the version that takes place in the U.S./Canada.  I’d like to see a Chinese version of this game come out.  Maybe we could make our own…

Sweaty panda bears, here we come!