Finally Here!

 Resigned to my fate to fly United again today...sigh.. off I go, towards Europe... Europe?

 North over Canada and Baffin bay, nothing to see out the window now, as it's night up here all the time, it is pitch black. The green line is the shortest path, which we deviate from a bit. Not sure why they are not going straight north today.

 The map is funny of course because it's not round, scooting over the top of the planet shows like we are flying over Europe, which we sort of are, but the flat map is very deceiving.

 Cold and Chilly Greenland and Arctic.

 Dropping down in to the Russian far East. Murmansk and Arkhangel are infamous cold war ports.

 The coldest temp see up there was -102F and I missed it on the screen. It fluctuated a bit all the time.

-93F is -70C. it is a bit colder than the usual at 35000 ft.

 As we come down over Russia we pass Utaar Balaan and Mongolia, the restive western muslim areas of China to the right hand side then down the coast over Beijing. Flying this far north the world looks small, in the pic below we are equidistant from New Delhi or Northern Australia.

The flight path on the screen below is green, not quite as close to the pole I hoped, but not sure if winds were bad or what. The dotted line is the straightest line there on the curved surface of earth - we flew an extra 500 or so miles getting here today - but the plane made it in just under 14 hours. We are almost at the same latitude as Dubai, but it's not as hot... how come?

 The wonders of science...

At last on the ground in Shanghai and Damiao met me at the airport, what a nice guy! This is the Maglev station.

 The magnetic levitation train runs up to 430kmh, but it's raining, so only 300kmh today... :( Very smooth though, no idea you are going so fast.

In town the hotel was not bad at all, we just dropped the bags and ran, Damiao gave me a quick tour of where things are, then food, food, from Macau Portuguese custard tarts, (yummy) to the steam bun place we ate at below, all very good. Some of the dumpling had my famous ABM mushrooms inside! Yay! Before anyone asks, I was using antiseptic wipes in hotels before CBC had their horror story, so yes, all is wiped...phew!

 Damiao trying to avoid the pic, lol. Hopefully will meet his wife too for dinner Tuesday night. Walking around, I already bought an LED flashlight for 5 dollars. It has begun! In one market a woman grabbed me by the arm and literally tried to drag me in the shop, but it's not a shopping day!

 This is more like Shanghainese food says Damiao - and look how there's not a deep fried chicken ball with sweet and sour sauce in sight... It is cooler hereof late, highs of only 15C all week, so I bought a fleece at Uni Qlo - the Japnese version of the GAP. I always go there before leaving Tokyo.

 By People's Square Metro entrance: I am going to bed as I am worn out, Damiao had some work to do for his class tomorrow so he is gone too. The weather forecast is sketchy for the week sadly, Friday may be a rainy day so I will likely venture out of town. As part of the deal with United, my trip now ends December 1st - they were originally asking me to fly out Nov 25th, which meant arrival Nov 27th, which would not have given me much time at all in China - so I had them extend the ticket a day (and they ate the cost) - as they had put me in a funny position. So now I arrived on Nov 25th and leave on Dec 1st after all is said and done.

Big day tomorrow, All Day Shanghai! I cannot wait! it's 4 in the morning right now though, so as you can see, I cannot sleep!  :)