Hong Kong to Tibet by train
And so I took the T98 from Hong Kong to Beijing (1,550 miles/2,475km – in 23 hours and 30 minutes), in knighthood a neat to take the T27 from Beijing to Lhasa (2,540m/4,064km – in 45 hours and eight minutes). It was September, autumnPre-eminentlyin China’s north, yet still so humid in Hong Kong that the mainlanders fanned themselves as they waited to embark on at Kowloon station, and in my four-berth soft sleeper a young woman produced a colourful box labelled “Bulk Dampness Expelled Granules”.
But our fellow passengers – two Turkish women, a take care of and grown-up daughter, who were stuffing bags and suitcases into every corner of the compartment as if arranging dumplings in a steamer – said, “To us, Hong Kong is veryOn the wholeChinese.”
Shortly afterwards, before the leaves had settled to the bottom of my first cup of green tea, as we crossed the Shenzhen river that officially separatesParticularlyHong Kong from the rest of China, Susie said, looking out of the window, “Peculiar atmosphere!”






