This is the second in a series of blog posts about the SnapAdventures trip to Tibet running Apr 28-May 7. Check out the latest entries from the Blog page.

Well, we finally made it! After a combined 46 hours of train time, the 16 SnapAdventurers from Beijing have made it to Lhasa. Though our train was an hour late starting out from Xi’an, it ended up being only 10 minutes late arriving in Lhasa.

Everyone has been a good sport about being on a train for that long… it’s definitely an experience! The scenery outside slowly changes as the train rolls through some of the most inhospitable terrain you can imagine, and you can see why Chinese people are so proud of the railway. It really is quite a feat of engineering.

But there’s so much more to the train than that. From the Chinese and foreign tourists visiting this mystical land, to the Tibetans who were just tourists in other parts of China themselves, to the uptight train staff running the dining car like their own fiefdom, there’s no shortage of interesting characters to meet.

We’ve checked into the hotel and had a lovely dinner, and we’re all looking forward to visiting the famous Potala Palace tomorrow.