Ok this has to be short as I am heading off on the trans Manchurian soon and also into bandit territory without internet access. SO I can promise some great photos of the trouble that me and and a few others caused later but for now my favourite which got me into a lot of trouble with the locals as they were not happy that we went out on the ice sheet which is rapidly melting - but we had alot of fun! [View Full Entry]

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So with a sore face after so much laughing I try and get out of the Hostel but the lady working today seems to think I have not payed the bill so in a typical russian fashion there is a long protracted discussion - at least in english - where it starts with 'you are on list that say you no pay' - when I ask her to check the reciepts for the day I arrived 'no need you are on the list that say you no pay' this goes on for some time but the Russian's are used to dealing [View Full Entry]

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So day two in Moscow is preceeded by a brief encounter with a Russian couple staying at the same hostel but departing on my first night. Vadim Lukomskiy is my first real Russian conversation. He is from Murmansk and travels to Moscow for a conference where none of the other participants show up so he is there with his girlfriend and decides to take in the capital for the second time in his life. He is a giant bear of a man and we exchange stories of travel plans and general work and career comments. He is very impressed with my [View Full Entry]

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So the 26th April had one additional treat - the first ride on the Moscow Metro! Back at University one of my best friends (Louise Bastable) had a small book on the Moscow Metro that she had found in one of the second hand bookshops that filled Liverpool at the time - So we used to sit in our studio space over our lunch and go through the book in awe of what we saw and dreaming of a day we might have an opportunity to go to Moscow to see it. Through the book we travelled to Moscow many times [View Full Entry]

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So I awake early after another night of fifteen minutes sleep to see one of the great sights so far - the train is moving over a lake with no sign of land whatsoever and there is a blood red line of sunrise in the Horizon. The three russian bears were still asleep and snoring soundly bit I managed to sneak a picture although it does not do the scene justice! Then later when the three bears have arrived we tuck into the breakfast supplied. Food in Russia seems to have one key quality by which to rate it - how [View Full Entry]

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So yet another glorious day in Russia - I have to spend some time organising a ticket for the overnight train to Moscow - and then I head out to see the Hermitage. The spaces are magnificent and I have not taken any real pictures of the collection so that you can all see them for yourselves some time. The museum does have a fairly strong ancient world and very strong impressionist collection - but I know that I did not have time to see all of the areas of the museum and I am sure that there were wonderful things [View Full Entry]

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So after a late night I awake in my giant hotel room to another glorious morning of sun. I pack up and head for the Hostel recommended in the Lonely Planet guide only to find it does not exist anymore - so after hunting around I am back at the hotel where I started - which is very expensive and I learn Russia is an expensive place to be. So I get out as soon as I can to walk the main street Nevsky Prospekt which is simply like a fashion catwalk as you see a very distinct majority of very [View Full Entry]

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So after a night of pure bliss I awoke at 7:00am to have some breakfast and salvage my kit from the three lockers that I had benn forced to use by my new flatmates. From the ferry I walked into the centre in around half an hour and headed for the rail terminal. Ideally I wanted to cross into St.Petersburg for the early morning but I was told that the lunchtime train would arrive at 10:30 local time - which left it a bit late but I was keen to push on and so took the opportunity to leave early. This [View Full Entry]

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So I manage to get more time in the Old town before heading down to the oil pumper - basically the ferry is a floating disco and all of the single people in stockholm and all of the single people in stockholm get on hoping to strike oil somewhere on the overnight journey. The last time I took this you could see the disaster potential and this time would be no different. I made my way down to the bowels of the boat to find my extremely cramped home for the night. As you can imgine I was not popular for [View Full Entry]

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After a rushed goodbye - as I slept in! - I depart from Kamila and Barthos's place (and trying to get them to come to Hong Kong) I rush over town to catch the train over to Malmo before switching to catch the train to Stockholm. The train passes over the long bridge between Copenhagen and Malmo and Calatrava's large tower dominates the skyline. Almost make the same error of getting off at Malmo and not Malmo central but arrive there in good time. After an hour or so on the platform its off to Stockholm - around a six hour [View Full Entry]

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