Overland travel Archives

How to Take the Ferry to Hokkaido

Most visitors to Hokkaido fly in, but to do it overland you have two options – bullet train or ferry.

If you have the JR Pass, the train’s the way to go – with the bullet train having recently been extended from Aomori through the Seikan Tunnel to Hakodate, you can now reach Hakodate (specifically Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto Sation on the edge of town) in 4 hours with a direct Hayabusa train from Tokyo. However from there it’s still another 3.5 hours to Sapporo on the Super Hokuto express train – the shinkansen is currently being extended to Sapporo which will allow for direct Tokyo-Sapporo trains taking just 5 hours or so, but that won’t be finished until 2031.

For those without the JR Pass, the ferry is way, way cheaper than the shinkansen (so is flying of course, but the ferry is a nice scenic overland alternative). And if you’re aiming for Hokkaido overland from Kansai or Nagoya, the overnight ferry is surely a cruisier option than the train dogleg through Tokyo.

(There is actually one more option – using the local trains. But having spent 2 days of my life getting back from Sapporo to Kyoto this way (following a bizarre encounter with a scary scissor-wielding lady after my ferry was cancelled) I can say it isn’t a good idea unless you break it up and make plenty of stops (e.g. by using the Seishun 18 Kippu). There’s certainly plenty to see in the Tohoku region to justify it – though it’d be more fun with the JR Pass!)

Anyway, back to the sea routes. Ferries to Hokkaido’s ports of Otaru and Tomakomai leave from multiple ports on the main Honshu island; in addition to the shorter crossings from Aomori Prefecture, there are these long-distance routes:

Maizuru (Kyoto Prefecture)-Otaru
Tsuruga (Fukui Prefecture)-Niigata-Akita-Tomakomai
Nagoya-Sendai-Tomakomai
Oarai (Ibaraki Prefecture)-Tomakomai

I’ve taken the ferry to/from Hokkaido 5 times and it was a pleasant journey on every occasion. The one shocker was when my return ferry got cancelled due to storms, leading to above-mentioned ridiculous 2-day journey – I had to be back in time for work so couldn’t risk chilling & waiting for the next ferry. All of which goes to say, be aware of the possibility of cancellations and prepared to be flexible should that happen.

From Aomori Prefecture: as well as the above long-distance routes there are also a few shorter crossings from Aomori Prefecture at the northern tip of Honshu, which would be best if you’re road tripping it:

Hachinohe-Tomakomai
Omasaki-Hakodate
Aomori City-Hakodate

The Shimokita Peninsula is home to Osorezan (Mt Dread or Mt Fear), an otherworldly volcanic landscape which serves as the gateway to the underworld in Japanese mythology. It’s a fascinating place and if you are on your own wheels, or are travelling through Tohoku taking your time with stops, this is a good route to take. Ferries cross to Hakodate from Omasaki at the tip of the peninsula.

How to Book Japanese Ferry Tickets

The easiest way is online in advance with Direct Ferries here (I’ve never used them for Japanese domestic ferries as I haven’t taken one for a few years, but regularly do so for Japan-Korea ferries and they’re easy & reliable)

You can also just rock up on the day and buy a ticket in the terminal – I’ve done so every time (before the rise of OTAs) and never had a problem (no guarantee of course). Next time I’ll use Direct Ferries.

Ferry Terminal Access

Otaru is an attractive little canal town with good train connections to Sapporo (30-45 minutes); if you’re heading to Niseko you can do so directly from Otaru (as I once did) by staying overnight then taking a morning train to Kutchan (and local bus or taxi from there). The nearest station to the port is Minami-Otaru, a 20-minute walk away; Minami-Otaru is one stop east of Otaru Station i.e. one stop before Otaru Station when coming from Sapporo.

Tomakomai is the other way from Sapporo and slightly further out, an industrial port which I mostly remember for this bizarre situation I once found myself in there. It’s an hour-and-a-bit by train from Sapporo Station (or 45 minutes if you take the limited express), but then you have to get from Tomakomai Station to the port. Easiest way is by taxi, or you can take the bus from the bus stops outside (to the left when you com out of the north exit). If you don’t read Japanese you’ll need to ask for help with working the bus out; I’m not putting the bus times & numbers here as they change and there’s no easy way to keep track of the changes. To further complicate matters, ferries to Sendai/Nagoya/Oarai and Akita/Niigata/Tsuruga leave from different ports – Tomakomai Port (10-minute bus ride) for the former and Tomakomai East Port (30km away) for the latter. When departing from Tomakomai you’ll need to catch the bus from the bus stops outside the train station (ask someone to help you find the correct stop) or jump in a taxi. The navigation’s easier when arriving in Tomakomai, as they have buses waiting when you disembark, including buses direct to Sapporo Station (you should definitely take this option if heading to Sapporo); if you’re heading east first to Kushiro, Shiretoko Peninsula, Abashiri etc then take the bus to Tomakomai Station and the train to Minami-Chitose where you can transfer to the limited express trains coming though from Sapporo to points east.

Maizuru
The port’s a 20-minute walk from Maizuru Station, if you take the fastest route. On ferry days there are buses meeting passengers off certain trains (ask the JR staff at the station), or a taxi will do it in 10 minutes. Walking takes you through the town centre – nothing too lively but you’ll find ramen joints and convenience stores etc. Arriving to Maizuru in the evening you can just about catch the last train that makes the connection to Kyoto at Ayabe (with a second change at Sonobe; double check this using Hyperdia as details may change), but you have to absolutely leg it; if you take a wrong turn you’ll miss it. If you don’t fancy that, have heavy luggage etc, you’ll want to have a taxi pre-booked to meet you off the ferry, or just book a room in Maizuru (not a bad idea – it’s a lovely bit of coastline and you can visit nearby Amanohashidate, one of the so-called 3 Great Views of Japan)

Tsuruga
Although not in Kyoto Prefecture, the port of Tsuruga in Fukui Prefecture is actually more convenient than Maizuru for Kyoto City, being just 50 pretty minutes away on the Thunderbird express via the Kosei Line running up the western shore of Japan’s largest lake, Biwako (or about 2 hours by local trains with changes, check Hyperdia). From Tsuruga Station it’s a 10-minute taxi ride to the ferry terminal. You can get a meal or stock up on snacks in the vicinity of Tsuruga Station.

Niigata is a fairly large city and the port’s a few miles out from the centre. Eat & stock up in the busy shopping area near the station then take a taxi (15 minutes) or bus (use Google Maps) to the ferry terminal.

Akita
The terminal’s a 20-minute walk from Tsuchizaki Station, which is one stop north (7 minutes) of Akita Station.

Sendai
This one’s a bit of a trek from central Sendai; either take the Senseki Line to Nakanosakae (20 minutes) then a taxi (10 minutes) from there, or the bus direct from Sendai Station. The routes are clearly explained here. When disembarking in the morning from Hokkaido, buses wait to take you direct to Sendai Station.

Oarai
You can actually buy combo bus & ferry through-tickets all the way from Tokyo (Mito Station) to Sapporo, see here.

If you prefer to make your own way to the port use the Joban Line from Ueno Station, it takes around 2 hours taking the JR limited express then switching to the private Kashima Rinkai Railway (see Hyperdia for details), and the ferry terminal’s a 20-minute walk or quick taxi ride from Oarai Station.

Nagoya
The ferry terminal’s a 20-minute walk north of Kinjofuto Station, the last stop at the southern end of the Aonami Line (25 minutes from Nagoya Station).

Aomori City
From Aomori Station you can walk it in half an hour, or jump in a 10-minute taxi.

Any questions about any of these routes? Give me a shout below and I’ll get back to you.

Search & book Japanese ferry tickets on Direct Ferries.

Check out my quick guide to Sapporo

Also see my pages on ferries between Japan & Korea and the hydrofoil service between Fukuoka & Busan, and my Japan overland guide here.

The Yunnan Overland Backpacker Trail

China, Overland travel

I was just sorting through some old travel photos after finally gaining access to the hard drive from my broken old laptop, and realised I’d never posted about the Yunnan backpacker trail in Southwest China. The basic route goes from the sprawling provincial capital Kunming up to the ancient lakeside town of Dali, the ancient mountain town of Lijiang, breathtaking Tiger Leaping Gorge, and the Tibetan town of Deqen (aka Shangri La as explained here) on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau.

From Shangri La you can go no further along the road to Tibet Autonomous Prefecture, so most then backtrack though it is also possible to travel between Shangri La and Chengdu via a multi-day bus trip through the Tibetan prefectures of western Sichuan Province without entering TAR (see here for great pictures & description of that route).

When I did it I came from Chengdu and used this useful backdoor route of a night train out of Chengdu then morning bus from Panzihua (in southern Sichuan) directly up to Lijiang. This saves the long backtrack from Shangri La to Kunming later on, as by starting at Lijiang you can then go up to the gorge and Shangri La before heading back down to Dali and Kunming. It’s also one of the more scenic bus rides I’ve done, climbing from Panzhihua at 1000m up to Lijiang at 2400m up some terrific mountain roads – not a good route option if you suffer motion sickness though. Lots of puking in bags going on. The bullet train network has since connected Chengdu to Kunming, and in fact now reaches all the way to Dali, so it’d be fastest these days (though of course way more expensive) just to take the bullet train from Chengdu to Dali and start from there.

Lijiang:

Lijiang didn’t really blow me away to be honest – the architecture’s lovely and it’s surrounded by nice scenery, but it really does feel like a mega tourist trap with hordes of (largely domestic) visitors crowding its narrow lanes. However, I had a great time there – I stayed at Mama Naxi Guesthouse which had a good sociable atmosphere, and there I got talking with a few others getting a group together for Tiger Leaping Gorge. We were a German family of 3, a Dutch mother & daughter, a German guy, and myself, and we ended up hiring vans & drivers to take us right through the gorge and on to Shangri La along the back route via Baishuitai, a series of calcified limestone pools cascading down the mountainside.

Tiger Leaping Gorge:

The road isn’t for the faint of heart:

There’d recently been a series of landslides in the gorge, including a massive one which knocked out the road, so the usual itineraries were off. Our de facto leader was Peer, the German father, a seasoned explorer with multiple impressive kayaking, biking, and climbing feats under his belt (I mean genuinely impressive Himalayan expedition stuff), who’d travelled the region before, and he’d arranged through the guesthouse for one van to take us as far as the landslide, and another to pick us up on the other side after we’d crossed it on foot.

It wasn’t the first time I’d crossed a landslide on foot while carrying all my stuff – see this crazy journey in Laos for that – but this one was way bigger, the walk across way more exposed, the drop far more precipitous. A decent path had already been cut across it though (which was being used to ferry loads back and forth between vehicles on either side), so at least it was quite firm underfoot (though you knew it could all just slide again at any moment):

So we carefully crossed one by one, which was certainly a tad nerve-wracking, and rendezvoused with our second driver on the other side.

The main (multiday) hiking trail through the gorge was closed at the time due to the landslides, but we stopped at Tina’s Guesthouse for lunch and did the short, steep hike from there down to the raging river below (Tina’s is commonly used as start/finish points for treks in the gorge, baggage forwarding services etc, and I think they’d actually sorted the second vehicle for us). The hike down was sweaty work, but it was well worth the effort – the river really was raging following the torrential rains that’d caused the landslides, and while it was probably not the smartest thing to do it was a real rush taking a few pics from some rocks right above the roiling waters.

I’m not much of a selfie-taker but this one makes me laugh – was trying (and totally failing) to look nonchalant while crapping myself at the millions of gallons of raging river roaring down behind!

From there we drove on to Baishuitai before finally completing the final stretch to Shangri La in darkness, passing the time with riddles and word games. It was a long, long day, some 15 hours all in, but it really was a good one. We were all booked in at different accommodations, but met up again to explore Shangri La over the next couple of days, visiting Ganden Sumtsenling monastery, wandering the old town’s cobbled alleys, dancing in the square, sharing a Tibetan feast, and a couple of us wound up draped in flowers and line dancing in a Tibetan karaoke joint.

Baishuitai:

Shangri La:

From there it was a fond farewell to the group and a bus down to Dali, for a couple of days chilling by the lake and checking out another lovely old town. There are some decent bars there too which I checked out with a Dutch guy (with whom I’d also share a rather eventful night out in Bangkok a few months later). I stayed at Jade Emu Guesthouse which I would definitely recommend (or neighbouring 5 Elements Hostel), and visit the Bad Monkey for a lively drinking hole with their own quality local craft beers.

Dali:

After Dali I made my way to Kunming for a few days to plan my route to Southeast Asia. While not a particularly exciting city, the altitude gives it a pleasant climate (it’s known as the City of Eternal Spring) and staying at Cloudland Hostel I met some more interesting characters to hang out with including an Italian photographer just back from the China-Myanmar border region where he’d taken some outstanding photos documenting the effects of the double-edged sword of development on the hill tribe communities there. That was the border I wanted to cross, but the Myanmar overland situation ruled it out (and still does for the China border) so I ended up going down to Xishuangbanna by bus and on to Laos & Thailand from there – for more on the routes from Yunnan to SE Asia see here.

Life in Beijing: catching the bullet train

Beijing, China, Overland travel, Trains

You’re woken up by the sound of an old man violently expectorating in the hutong alleyway outside, cringing during the pause while he holds his mouthful of phlegm for a second or two between noisily bringing it up and noisily depositing it on the floor with typically exaggerated sound effects. Then (after the usual faffing around waiting to get your 100 yuan key deposit back upon check out) there comes a sardine-tin subway ride, the hordes pushing & shoving their way into the carriages before those inside have been able to get off, a veritable rugby scrum of inconsideration; those alighting scowl and mutter their anger towards the phalanx of morons pushing their way on at each station, yet they did the same when they boarded.

Subway ride dealt with, next up comes the joy of clearing the airport-style security at the railway station. Tickets & IDs must be shown to the guards at the entrance, and all bags must go through the scanners; the line is long, and it’s full of people hellbent on pushing their way through in front of whoever they can get in front of. No matter that it makes no difference whatsoever and the train doesn’t leave any earlier if you get into the station a few minutes faster; everybody still wants to get in there a few minutes faster.

Departures hall, Guangzhou South Station — Guangzhou South Station

Finally, you attain the air conditioned sanctuary of the departures area, a vast aircraft hangar-like space with seats and elbow room and coffee and noodles. Riding China’s bullet train system isn’t exactly the most user-friendly experience, but they definitely did a good job with the engineering side of things; the trains are sleek, fast, and comfortable, and the gargantuan stations are something else.

Then comes boarding time, and your gate’s escalators are opened for everyone to descend to the platform; another ridiculous crush takes shape as a mass of people hurry to get through first, for no reason whatsoever. Simmer down, you think; the departure time is fixed, we all have a seat, and our seats are pre-determined. No reason to rush.

Well, no reason that is, unless you’re one of the hopeless nicotine addicts who simply must power through one last cigarette before being locked inside a no-smoking train for an hour or two until the next station.

Smog through the bullet train window in the vicinity of Shijiazhuang — View from a high speed rail station somewhere in Hebei province

There are many such individuals ignoring the no smoking signs (and the pleas of the staff), so you descend the escalator into a fug of cigarette smoke mixing with the PM2.5; the pollution’s so thick you can see it in the air, with even just the far ends of the platforms looking hazy. The cigarettes stink, but they probably don’t make much difference given the filth you’re already breathing; should’ve kept your mask handy but it’s crammed down in your bag somewhere. At every station the train stops at along the way, all these smokers will gather by the doors as the train pulls in, cigarettes already in mouths, lighters already in hands, to leap out and furiously inhale as much tar as they can in 30 seconds before the train attendants yell at them to get back onboard; the platform is strewn with half-smoked cigarettes and they all pile back in. So much for the stations being no smoking areas! At least the no smoking on board is strictly enforced – lengthy announcements clearly explain that it could cause a fire, and that on a train travelling at 300kph this would be disastrous.

Finally boarding the train, it’s an absolute gong show waiting for everyone to settle down. The smokers huddle at the doors, flinging their cigarette butts to the ground at the last possible moment before crushing in, while bags are still being arranged and re-arranged, shoved up on the luggage rack, taken back down to get something out, shoved back up, people competing for the ‘best’ spots on the racks; you shove your bag wherever you can and take your seat, marvelling at just how much commotion it takes for everyone to get on and sit down.

Settle down they eventually all do, though not until well after the doors have closed and the train is already pulling out through the suburbs; anyway, now you can finally relax and enjoy the scenery through the window.

But today the scenery is grim, a spectral, smog-choked land rushing by the window under a smothering blanket of airborne foulness. The views are great sometimes to be fair, but not today… this is just one of those days, one of those days when it feels like China is chewing you up and spitting you out – spitting you out with an exaggerated sound effect like a mouthful of phlegm.

—

Make sure to sign up for a VPN service before arriving in China so you can use the internet as normal – see here

For more China posts, click here

See my China overland travel guide here; book Chinese trains online here*

(*this is an affiliate link i.e. if you use it to book a train ticket, 4corners7seas will receive a commission; this comes out of their profit margin at no extra cost to you. Thank you in advance should you choose to use this link!)

Hospitality and Scorpions in Marble Canyon

Canada & USA, Overland travel, Travel tales

The Navajo Bridge spanning Marble Canyon, Arizona

We were two weeks into our epic road trip around the US, now driving through the incredible southwestern states of New Mexico and Arizona; we’d just spent two days in Albuquerque for the July 4 Independence Day celebrations (and also one of my companion’s birthdays), and the next point of call was the Grand Canyon.

The Grand Canyon’s North Rim is known for having more spectacular views than the more oft-visited South Rim, and as we intended to continue north from the Grand Canyon to visit a couple of Utah’s stunning national parks (namely, Zion & Bryce Canyon) it made sense for us to visit the North Rim (the South Rim is the more-visited due to its closer proximity to Las Vegas, the starting point for many Grand Canyon visits).

The downside to aiming for the North Rim from Albuquerque was we’d have to drive an extra couple of hours to reach it, crossing the Colorado River upstream of the Grand Canyon via the Navajo Bridge in Marble Canyon, then coming back around to the North Rim. But it made sense with our overall route, so we went for it; it was an awesome day’s ride through some amazing scenery, especially after turning north at Flagstaff when the sunset brought brilliant shades of rose and lavender out of the vast desert landscapes. Then we drove on into the night with a few more hours on the road ahead of us, but ran into a string of terrific storms with absolutely torrential rain belting down, thunder & lightning, the full works, and we didn’t make good time.

So when we found ourselves approaching the small community of Marble Canyon late that night, we decided to ask at the gas station if there was anywhere we could pitch up to sleep. Pressing on seemed like a bad idea, and we figured it’d be safer to stop for the night and finish off the remaining two hours of the drive in the morning (well, as long as some psycho hillbillies didn’t come along in the night, we joked – little knowing that a few weeks later in the Rockies we would have a run in with precisely one of those, which really wasn’t funny at all).

As luck would have it there was a pair of guys sat outside the gas station drinking beers, one older chap, one around our age i.e. early 20s (…yes, this is quite an old story!). The older bloke gave us directions to somewhere we could camp, which sounded totally sketchy and exactly the sort of place a psycho could follow you and act out his horror movie fantasies; we ummed an ahh’d about that for a minute, and then the younger guy did us one of the most absolute solid bits of random kindness I’ve ever experienced from a stranger – he invited the four of us to crash on his cabin floor for the night, having only just met us, and then went out of his way to make us as comfortable as possible.

Turned out he was from Phoenix (in the south of Arizona), and was in Marble Canyon for the summer to get his fly fishing guide’s licence; his name was Zach and he had a cabin near the gas station, and with the four of us as guests plus himself it was a pretty tight fit.

But he made sure we had a bite to eat, and we hung out with a few beers and watched a DVD (Meet the Parents); he had to be up and out before dawn to go fishing, so said he’d leave us sleeping and told us to help ourselves to breakfast and to simply close the door behind us when we left. Not much need for locks out there, apparently.

But before we bedded down for the night, he took us out for a walk to the canyon. Marble Canyon the town is named for the geographical feature of the same name, a part of the Grand Canyon system; the Colorado River flows south through Marble Canyon and then when it cuts west it opens out to become the Grand Canyon. It’s a spectacular sight in its own right, nothing on the scale of what it becomes downriver but still a deep, dramatic gorge cut through the desert by an emerald green river. We couldn’t make out the brilliant colours by the light of the moon which now lit the landscape with the storms having passed, but it looked otherworldly bathed in that brilliant silver light as we walked over to the edge of the canyon and peered in; something I did again in the morning, when it was less mysterious but daylight revealed the beautiful hues of the Vermillion Cliffs and Echo Cliffs framing the valley to the west & east, respectively, and the deep green of the waters below. It really is an amazing spot.

Finally, retuning to the cabin, Zach said it was time for his nightly scorpion round – he’d been stung on the foot a month or so earlier and the resulting days of agonising pain had caused him to adopt a zero tolerance policy. I’d never previously been aware of the fact, but scorpions glow white under UV light due to the chemical secretions coating their exoskeletons (the same sort of glow a gin & tonic has under UV lights in a club). I accompanied him on a walk around the outside of the hut as he shined a UV bulb all over the exterior wall, picking out a number of scorpions hiding in the crevices. These he dispatched unceremoniously with a pair of scissors, though I recall one of them putting up an almighty struggle, gripping the scissors and rapidly stinging the metal with its tail in an impressive display of fighting spirit. To be honest I felt bad for these creatures, but Zach’s descriptions of the pain he’d endured explained this policy – scorpion venom acts on the nervous system with long-lasting and excruciatingly painful effects.

Scorpions weren’t the only critters living on the outside of his cabin though; we also found a black widow spider in its web in front of the window.

“Better get that too,” he said, going after it with the scissors but succeeding only in removing a single leg. The now 7-legged spider fled into a crack in the wall and out of harm’s way, and I figured it would only be karma if one of us was to cop a spider bite during the night…

That led me to ask what exactly would happen in such a situation, and he explained the nearest hospital was over a hundred miles away, but there was a 2-seat light plane and a small airstrip nearby, and one guy in town who could fly it.

“But what if he’s the victim?” was the obvious question. And the answer? He’d be up shit creek without a paddle, that’s what!

That concluded the evening; and what with the crazy storms, a random act of the warmest hospitality, a moonlit wander in the desert, and a grim but fascinating arachnid extermination spree, it was a pretty memorable one. We bunked down top to tail on the cabin floor, and when morning came our host was gone; I took a quick walk over to see the canyon by daylight, and we were soon on our way. There wasn’t any Facebook back then, no smartphones, but we made sure to note the address and sent him a postcard to say thank you.

Have you experienced any random acts of hospitality on your travels? Leave a comment below!

Chinese Visa Extensions in Leshan and Kaifeng

Chengdu, China, Overland travel

Kaifeng Drum Tower — Kaifeng’s Drum Tower

If you’re in China on a tourist (L) visa and want to get more time in the country without having to go down to Hong Kong for a new visa, you may be able to extend your existing visa at a Public Security Bureau office.

The extension rules officially require you to have several thousand dollars in a Chinese bank account – obviously that’s quite a lot to come up with if you’re backpacking, and opening an account is also a hassle, but the rules are enforced differently in different places.

Some PSB offices are notoriously strict, and will absolutely not extend your visa without checking all the requirements have been met, while others are happy to do it (and collect the processing fees!) without enforcing the bank account requirement.

I did once visit the Beijing PSB, and there was clearly no way they’d do it so easily there. It’s also a soul-crushingly grim facility staffed by some particularly surly officers; if you haven’t already gone and got the bank account and all the paperwork sorted in advance, just don’t bother going anywhere near the place. Either do the bank account & proof of funds, or take a trip to somewhere with a more relaxed PSB.

The PSBs known for being amenable to extensions without bank account statements are widely discussed on Lonely Planet’s Thorntree boards; those along the Yunnan tourist trail in Lijiang & Shangri-la, for example, are known for this, as are the offices in Leshan and Kaifeng.

A huge amount’s already been written & discussed about all this on the internet and the situation frequently changes, so the purpose of this post is not to provide a full and up-to-date visa extension guide (see this Lonely Planet thread for recent discussion & updates); here I’ll just relate my own experiences of extending at the PSB offices in the cities of Kaifeng and Leshan, and how enjoyable they are as travel destinations while you’re getting your red tape sorted.

The first time I looked into extending I initially wasted a day visiting the Beijing PSB, then ruled out Kaifeng because it was still a 10-hour slow train ride (it’s now just a 3-hour bullet train ride), and ended up heading all the way down to Leshan via this monster 27-hour train ride to Chengdu (again, a thing of the past – bullet trains now do it in 8 hours)

Visa Extension in Leshan, Sichuan

Leshan is in Sichuan Province, not far from the provincial capital of Chengdu. As the home of the Leshan Great Buddha, it’s a popular stop on many Sichuan itineraries regardless of whether you need to extend your visa. Many visitors to the Leshan Buddha do it as a day trip from Chengdu, but if you’re extending your visa it’s necessary to stay in town as you have to be registered at accommodation in the same place as the PSB issuing the extension.

It’s a decent place to spend a couple of nights though, so it’s a good extension option. Between visiting the Great Buddha and making your application at the PSB (and going back next day to collect) your days will be pretty full, and in the evenings you can get stuck in to the local cuisine. There are some great roadside BBQ joints, and the local take on tan tan noodles (served cold and very spicy) are absolutely spot on if you’re there in the hot & sweaty summer months (although the ice cream I tried literally tasted of hairspray).

Unfortunately I don’t recall the name of the decent little hotel I stayed at (picked out from the Lonely Planet book, I think), but you can search & book Leshan hotels here

Leshan can be reached easily from Chengdu by bullet train (around 50 minutes) or highway bus (2 hours). Extending only takes a day, and when I did it the Leshan PSB staff were by far the friendliest uniformed Chinese officials I’ve ever encountered… at time of writing in 2018 it’s still regarded as the easiest & friendliest place to extend in China.

Throw in a visit to the Buddha, and it’s a good option if it fits your route. I actually witnessed a full-blown brawl on the steep steps at the Buddha that I still can’t believe didn’t end in tragedy – full story here. Hopefully your visit will be a bit more chilled!

Visa Extension in Kaifeng, Henan

Kaifeng’s a city of great historical importance, but of rather less modern significance. It was the capital of China for 160 years during the Song Dynasty, and in those days was one of the largest cities in the world; these days it’s a scrappy mid-sized provincial city which sees few international visitors.

It’s definitely quite rough around the edges, but it has a wealth of historical sites including one of the few complete city walls remaining in China (not quite as impressive as those in Xi’an and Nanjing though), various gates and pagodas, and the Dragon Pavilion out over a long bridge across Yangjia Lake (one of several large lakes in the city).

While I wouldn’t travel to Kaifeng just for the sightseeing (and certainly not for the atmosphere or the shopping), there is enough cool stuff to make for some interesting wanderings while you wait for your visa and the lakes would be pleasant spots to hang out and people-watch (but not in winter – it was already pretty damn freezing when I was there, and that was only early November).

Kaifeng also has the advantage of being just 3 hours from Beijing or 5 hours from Shanghai by bullet train, making it possible to extend your visa with just an overnight stay as long as you get to the PSB early enough on the first day. (Note – according to recent reports (see #679) it presently takes several days to process an extension in Kaifeng, so be sure to check the latest reports and take them into account)

There’s only one direct Beijing-Kaifeng bullet train each way per day, but you can also access Kaifeng via Zhengzhou. There are dozens of bullet trains daily between Beijing West & Zhengzhou East, taking 2h30 to 3h30; at Zhengzhou East you can switch to another bullet train to Kaifeng. Once the Zhengzhou-Kaifeng Intercity Railway is fully operational you’ll be able to take the bullet train from Zhengzhou East to Kaifeng’s main station (35 mins), but until then it only gets you to Kaifeng North (20 mins) which is a long way out from the centre. For the time being, therefore, the bus may be preferable (slower, but gets you direct to the centre of Kaifeng) – there are regular buses back & forth to Kaifeng from the High Speed Rail Bus Station next to Zhengzhou East (80 minutes, running from 07:00 to 20:00, departing every 10-15 minutes as per here)

I stayed at Kaifeng International Hostel, which is convenient for the PSB office and just round the corner from Baogong Lake. They were under renovation at the time, but the friendly owner opened a room up for me anyway and the place appears to be looking good now.

Should You Extend Your Visa in Leshan or Kaifeng?

If you’re in Beijing or Shanghai and just want to extend then head back to the city, or you want to extend somewhere en route between the two, definitely Kaifeng. But if you’re not doing that and are just looking for a good place to stay while extending, Leshan is better. And if you’re already planning your route to include Sichuan, then Leshan’s the obvious choice. (NB as noted above, according to recent reports it presently takes several days to process an extension in Kaifeng, so be sure to check the latest reports and take them into account)

Other PSB Options for Visa Extensions

A few other PSBs with reputations for being easy to extend at are those at the main tourist spots in Yunnan – Dali, Lijiang, and Shangri-la. Lanzhou (capital of Gansu Province) is also reported to be good. This list is by no means exhaustive, so do make sure to do your own research; but if you’re considering Kaifeng or Leshan, hopefully this post helps you out with that.

Useful Links

Can’t extend? Head to Hong Kong to apply for a new visa

Book Kaifeng International Hostel or search other hotels in Kaifeng

Hotels in Leshan

Make sure to sign up for a VPN service before arriving in China so you can use the internet as normal – see here

Use chinatrainguide for journey planning, and see my China overland travel page; to book Chinese trains online use 12go Asia

Overland Adventures: the stinky Filipino fish bus

Overland travel, Philippines, Southeast Asia, Travel tales

Naked children leapt from the ramshackle pier in the tropical downpour, laughing and screaming as lightning flickered across the edges of a sky as threatening as any I’ve yet seen.

“That boat?” I asked hopefully, indicating the larger and (slightly) more seaworthy-looking of the two pieces of junk lashed to the pier.

“No, the other one,” he replied, pointing at the crappy little outrigger.

“Seriously? Five hours in that? Going across that?!” I said, pointing out over the ominous waters. This did not look like a good idea…

Snorkelling with whale sharks in Donsol, Philippines — Snorkelling with whale sharks in Donsol

A couple of days earlier I’d been snorkelling with whale sharks in Donsol (an amazing experience) and was now trying to get to Boracay; the most direct route was a short ferry from Pilar (near Donsol) over to Masbate City on Masbate Island (one of the more nondescript towns I’ve ever been stuck in overnight), then a 5-hour ferry crossing from Balud on the far side of Masbate over to Panay Island, and finally a bus to Boracay. Not exactly direct, but such is the nature of overland travel in the sprawling archipelago that is the Philippines.

But when I’d heard there was a ferry from Masbate over to Panay, I’d imagined something more like, well, an actual ferry. While this little thing looked fine for a calm crossing in clear weather, I definitely wouldn’t want to be caught two hours out in open water in a tropical squall in a boat like that. Looked like a recipe for disaster to me, and sadly the Philippines is anything but a stranger to boat disasters.

He assured me it was fine, but it was rainy season and the majority of my days in the Philippines up to that point had seen biblical rainfall and dramatic lightning displays flashing across roiling purple skies.

“How’s the weather looking tomorrow mate?” I asked, the answer coming in the form of a shrug.

By now a curious crowd had gathered around where we were standing in the shelter of a kind of bandstand at the start of the pier, the rain forming walls of water where it sluiced off the edges of the roof.

“Ok,” I continued, “so where’s your friend’s hotel again?”

A row of jeepneys at the bus station in Legazpi — A row of jeepneys, one of the main transport options in the Philippines

I always prefer to travel overland (or sea) when feasible, but when doing so you sometimes have to have a rethink. If there are 80 people cramming into a 30-seat bus, or your bus driver looks drunk, don’t get on the bus; if the ferry seems dangerously overcrowded and doesn’t have any lifeboats, or the boat doesn’t look seaworthy and it’s sailing out into storms, don’t get on the boat. I figured this might be time for such a judgement call, but also that I might as well stay the night and make the call in the morning after seeing the sea and the sky. And anyway I didn’t really want to have done the 2-hour van ride over from Masbate City only to go straight back (pretty though the scenery had been), so I figured I’d check into this guy’s friend’s hotel and sleep on it.

He pointed out one of the concrete blocks lined up along the road. It would be grim, for sure, but it’d suffice for the night before catching the boat first thing the next day or heading back to Masbate.

No way I was walking out through that waterfall though, so I figured I’d stay dry and wait it out here with my new friend and our audience. It’s always fun interacting with the locals in seldom-visited little corners of a country like this.

Except it isn’t. Not always. Sometimes instead of friendliness there’s a dodgy feeling, something vaguely threatening, or even in-your-face hostility, and it doesn’t help when it’s happening in a language you don’t understand.

One of the crowd of onlookers had pushed his way through to the front, and now appeared to be berating me in Tagalog (at least I guess it was Tagalog, though it could’ve been one of the other myriad languages spoken around the Philippines).

He appeared to be either the village drunk or the village idiot, perhaps both (he certainly smelled of something potent), and he appeared to be very angry about something. I had no idea what he was yelling at me, but the guy I’d been speaking to then engaged him in a bout of verbal jousting.

They took turns to make digs at each other, half addressing one another and half addressing me, and definitely playing it up for the crowd who sporadically burst into raucous laughter and occasional jeers.

I had no idea if I was the butt of the joke, or if the one guy was standing up for me and taking the piss out of the other guy, or if they were publicly discussing the best way to spend my money and dispose of my body, or if they were arguing about nothing whatsoever to do with me. No idea. But I did know that the situation felt dodgy, and the drunk guy was definitely taking an aggressive posture toward me. Even if they were just goading and baiting that guy for fun and nothing to do with me, that still constituted a shitty situation in my book – sheltering from the rain with an agitated crowd, waiting to head to a shithole hotel in order to catch a piece of sea junk in the morning for 5 hours through potential thunderstorms.

“Ok fuck this, I’m bailing,” I thought to myself, and shouldering my pack I interjected into the argument to thank the guy for his help and walked off through the thumb-sized raindrops towards the bus stop.

I was drenched to the bone in an instant, but I ignored the calls from behind and hurried through the rain to hopefully catch a same-day bus back where I’d come from.

Of course, as soon as I reached the bus stop 5 minutes later the rain stopped and the fierce tropical sun re-emerged to begin the process of baking everything dry (everything except my stuff, anyway). But whatever, I was at least glad to find a minivan waiting to fill up for the trip back across the island. He already had a couple of passengers, so with me joining them we’d just need to wait for a few more.

I knew it might take a while so grabbed some coffee and lunch from the little store there, however before I’d even finished my coffee the van filled up – but not with people. No, we were sharing the space with several boxes of fresh fish, which were stacked on top of each other in the back with my bag on top of them. I tried to get both bags on my lap but only had room for the small one, and my fellow passengers had their own shit on their own laps. And there was no roof rack to tie it up top, and no floor space available. So up it went on top of all the cold dead fishes with all their empty staring eyes, and so it was that I ended up right back where I’d started, damp and sweaty and stinking of raw fish, checking back in to the same hotel I’d checked out of some seven hours earlier. I was not a happy camper, and I smelled like a rotten fishmonger for days.

The following night I sailed out of Masbate City on the overnight ferry down to Cebu, where I did some (outstanding) diving before finally making it back up to Boracay the long way around. That then gave me a big old backtrack to Cebu City again, but I never regretted not getting on that flimsy boat – it just didn’t feel right, and I had plenty of time to find another route. Things don’t always go according to plan when you insist on going overland, and changing things up on the fly is part & parcel of the game. This is especially true in places with challenging geography and poor infrastructure like the Philippines – but although it wasn’t all fun at the time, it is all part of the fun.