Yanggakdo Hotel Pyongyang

This replaces a previously 'holding' entry I had here. The earlier fixed rule about not writing about our visit got progressively more lax as the week progressed. Hence I can share a heck of a lot. This 5 day visit to North Korea has been far and away the most interesting place I have ever visited. No contest at all. Many places in the world are more beautiful, many are quite culturally different to my home, but nothing is like what we saw and experienced here. So come and enjoy a whole world...

Entry containing 5 photos titled: Painting, Pyongyang Arc de Triomph, Dear Kim, The Capitan greets, Night in Pyongyang

Entry containing 5 photos titled: Pyongyang City View, Street and Car in Pyongyang, Kims Mausoleum, DPRK statue Victory over the enemy, Street in Pyongyang downtown

Entry containing 5 photos titled: Yanggak Island on Taedong River, Village on the way to Panmunjeom, Traffic on the Highway to Kaesong, Removing the snow from the Highway to Kaesong, Panmunjeom, view to south

Entry containing 5 photos titled: Kaesong, Kaesong, Kaesong, Kaesong, Kaesong

Entry containing 5 photos titled: Juche Tower, Pyongyang Houses, Pyongyang street live, Pyongyang street live, Picture in middle school

Entry containing 3 photos titled: Pyongyang Sunset, Kim Il Sung Square to Juche Tower, Kim Il Sung Square to Juche Tower

We embarked on our 24 hour train to North Korea (DPRK) with a sense of excitement and trepidation. In our carriage we met a dutch pair, who reminded us very much of bookham legends, band players, drinkers and general merrymakers Dutch and Roger- they therefore quickly aquired their new title for the trip- 'Dutch Dutch and Roger'. We had the same iteneary as them, so we were to spend a lot of time with them over the coming days. The first DPRK hurdle is customs and immigration during the 6 hou...

Even our flight to Korea was interesting, Air Koryo flies an old Tupolev plane that looks like no other plane I had ever seen before. The handluggage compartments are open en the chairs can fold forwards completely. The foodtrays are made of metal and the walls and window shades have an oldfashioned pattern. I had some trouble locating my seatbelt and inside the plane it smelled of exhaust fumes...it was an interesting flight to say the least. Not only because of the airplane but also because...

From Pyongyang airport we went directly to the May Day Stadium to see the Mass Games.

Driving up to the stadium we saw groups of performers waiting outside the stadium until it was time to go in. There were also any Koreans waiting to go inside to see the performance.

I bought the first class ticket which meant a comfy chair behind a table with a great unobstructed view of the performance.

The show started with what seemed to be a warm up for the people forming the back...