My 26 Hour Drive Across China
Just Three People, Two Cats in a Volkswagen
26 hours is a hell of a travel day no matter what mode of transportation you’re talking about. But what about a drive across China?
Then add two passengers with you.
Oh yeah, and two cats.
Not to mention, all of us fit inside a small Volkswagen sedan with half of our belongings.
This is what my girlfriend and I faced when deciding to move across the country from Qingdao to Shenzhen.
Before the Journey
If you’ve been following my blog for some time you would’ve seen my previous post about “My Expat Job Search” where I detailed how I was finally leaving behind English teaching and starting my first “big boy job” (and how YOU can do it too!). Well, things progressed in my search enough to where it warranted a move out to Shenzhen.
The only problem was that we have a newly adopted 1-month-old kitten, a three-year-old fatty, and half of our stuff left to take! We knew that we didn’t want to subject our cats to air travel if we didn’t absolutely have to, so driving was the next best thing.
Pushing aside the dread of an absolutely packed 26-hour drive through one of the most tropical and humid places in China, I was partly excited to partake in this journey. I’ve never seen the true countryside of China, so driving across its vast land could be a great opportunity to see new things!
We packed most of our clothes, kitchen utensils and things that we did not immediately need and sent them via post. 8 extremely heavy boxes cost about 500 RMB to send ($72), not bad at all! What was left was taking our most valuable items (my computer mostly) and ourselves to Shenzhen!
I don’t have a license in China as the prospect of driving in this country is absolutely terrifying, so the next best thing was to pay a driver. We spent about 4,500 RMB $652 (including tip) for him to drive us approximately 2,000 miles, also not a bad deal!
Thus, the day finally came, and we were off.
Getting Started
The thing we were most worried about during this drive is that our resident cat, the three-year-old, hadn’t warmed up to the new baby yet. Luckily, the doctor gave us a prescription for a mellowing agent to give our older cat, so she slept most of the way there.
This was not the same for our little boy Yugi, who was an absolute menace throughout the ride. Prior to the drive, he’d been peeing about once every day as he’s still on a milk diet, so we were hoping to be lucky and miss his cycle while driving.
Well, within the first 5 minutes, he’d already peed on my girlfriend. Luckily it didn’t smell, so we thought we’d weathered the storm.
We were officially leaving Qingdao, and had what we THOUGHT would be 19 hours to go!
Breaks, Breaks, and Breaks
We THOUGHT it’d be about 19 hours, but this changed quickly due to the amount of breaks we were taking. Every two hours we would stop for about 20 minutes or so.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this, as we wanted our driver to be conscious and alert. I can admit now that I wish we had gone a little faster, I was so dang excited to get to the new city!
Each rest stop we made it to along the way was different. Some were lavish and full of life and restaurants, while some were completely barebones and worn down. My girlfriend stated:
“It’s a point that the quality of your rest station is the quality of your entire town. You can see which one is shit compared to the rest.”
I guess this was true, because I could see that each town with the best rest stop had some wonderful food, restaurants, and even snacks to choose from that I couldn’t get in Qingdao!
Little Yugi and His Piss Adventures
Just our luck, it seems that Yugi decided to become a big boy on the one day we needed him to hold his pee. Throughout the night he’d peed probably 4 times, all of which was on our clothes while we were holding him.
Our timing was off, as at each rest stop, we’d try to get him to go on the pad that he’s used to, but he’d always get us an hour after while he was sleeping. It’s astounding that the first time he peed three times in a day in his entire life is when we were stuck in a packed car driving 2,000 miles.
The Scariest Rest Stop I’ve Ever Been
Do you guys know that episode of Spongebob where he misses the bus and is stuck in Rock Bottom? Well, my girlfriend and I found ourselves in the Chinese equivalent.
Our driver decided to stop and have dinner, so we made our way to look around. The inside of the rest stop was actually quite nice, equipped with multiple restaurants, a supermarket, and even a KFC.
My girlfriend found a noodle shop she wanted to order from. Yet, when she started to order the lady behind the register started screaming at the restaurant across the hall from her. She continued screaming for around a minute and a half while my girlfriend and I sat there and stared at each other.
“What the hell?”
In the meantime, we heard more screaming from other groups of people. There was something in the air here, everyone seemed hostile and pissed off. A lot of eyes stuck to me the entire time we were there, so we skurried off and made an escape.
Finally Pulling In
After all of our breaks (which were warranted), we finally made it to our new home at 8:00 AM, a full 26 hours after we started. The very first thing we did when arriving (besides taking up our luggage) was to take a shower to wash off all of little Yugi’s piss.
Driving in a piss-filled car for 26 hours really sticks to your skin, trust me. It was the best shower I’ve ever experienced.
At the end of the day, it was a crazy drive, and a great experience. We’re now in Shenzhen. I want to apologize for my lack of uploading both here on Medium and on YouTube as we’ve been transitioning into this new city and my new job.
As things begin to settle I will return to a frequent posting schedule on both platforms. Until then, see you later!
What’s your longest drive experience? Comment down below!
Did you enjoy this post? Well, you can find more like it at the links below:
My Medium Landing Page, my YouTube, my TikTok, and my Instagram
You may also enjoy these blog posts:
