This is it: After more than four weeks on the road, I will finally start the Trans Siberian Railway today. My train leaves at 1620h from Moscow's Yaroslavl station, and I am heading for Yekaterinburg, arriving there some 26h later. I am traveling with Alex, a Dutch guy I met in Moscow, for this leg of the journey, who his on is way to Iran through Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The epic Trans Siberian is maybe the greatest train journey in the world, and I have dreamed about taking it for a long time. When you think of the Transsib, don't [View Full Entry]

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The last time I was in Moscow was in 1999 on a stopover coming from Hong Kong. Now, 9 years later, I arrived in the city by overnight train from St. Petersburg just after 0900h on May 9th, right on time for the Victory Day celebrations on that same day. My stay in Moscow was marked by the revisiting of my old Russian university-friend Oksana (we studied together back in 1998 in London), who also introduced me to her friends Alexander and Natalie (both born and living in Moscow). All in all, I spent three days in their respective companies, and [View Full Entry]

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After taking the train from Helsinki, I finally arrived in Russia, where I will commence on the Trans Siberian Railway in a week or so, which officially starts from Moscow. Whilst so far I have travelled by a combination of trains, buses and boats (plus planes if you include the week of trekking in Turkey), for the next 8000km or so until Beijing the only mode of transport will be trains. Awesome! St. Petersburg fully lived up to the image I had of it in my mind. Having wanted to go here for a long time, it is everything I expected [View Full Entry]

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From Tallinn I took the ferry across the straight to get to Helsinki. The two cities lie only 80km apart, and the crossing takes just under two hours. After boarding the ferry I took a nap, and when I woke up about 1 1/2h later, we were, well, still in Tallinn. Great! I discovered that we had not even left the port due to some technical problems with the ship. After spending another good hour on the broken ferry and not being allowed to leave, we were finally ushered onto another (although much nicer) ferry. Best thing there was that they [View Full Entry]

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Three Baltic capitals, three UNESCO-protected Old Towns. So what does this actually mean, acquiring UNESCO-recognition? In short, any country can suggest a place it wants to have included in UNESCO's list of word heritage sites, and if accepted, the place is recognized as being of outstanding natural or cultural importance, being seen as "our legacy from the past, what we live with today, and what we pass on to future generations" (UNESCO website). In other words, each site is thus seen as being in the interest of the international community to preserve for future generations. Currently, there are about 850 World [View Full Entry]

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When Latvians go to the sauna, they keep their swimsuits on. I found this out the hard way when I was standing stark-naked in the middle of the main room of the sauna, with everyone else being dressed and staring at me as if I was the first guy they had seen without clothes in their entire life's. Well, the people I had asked to find this place never mentioned that fact to me, so... Altogether though, it was a very relaxing afternoon. Especially the "salt sauna", where there was a huge basket full of salt to rub your skin with, [View Full Entry]

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After Vilnius, I went to see one of the most inspiring sites in Lithuania: The Hill of Crosses. Situated near the city of Šiauliai (pronounced shoo-lay, sounds a bit Asian to me) in the north of the country, the hill houses more than 50.000 (!) crosses. The tradition of placing crosses here dates way back (around the 14th century) and today is the finest example of Lithuanian defiance of foreign invaders. After the second World War, Lithuania was of course part of the Soviet Union. During the Soviet era, the pilgrimage to the Hill of Crosses served as a vital expression [View Full Entry]

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"Whats your mission on your travels?" That was the question I was asked by two girls I went out for dinner with on my last night in Vilnius. Well, a very good question indeed - what was my mission? Travel round the world walking backwards, or only using female donkeys as the preferred method of transportation, or taking a picture of every person I meet that was wearing pink sandals? To be honest, I don't have a mission. My only idea for the beginning of this trip is that I want to reach China by traveling overland. I feel this will [View Full Entry]

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From Berlin I took the train up to the island of Ruegen in the north of Germany, and from there I caught a ferry to Klaipeda in Lithuania. The ferry ride was smooth. The only time a bit of action arose when I decided to burn a piece of paper in my cabin. The crew of the vessel were not amused at all about this, as I soon found out when about seven crew-members appeared outside my door :-) After mediterranean Antalya and hip Berlin, Klaipeda was somewhat of an anticlimax. The guidebook I was reading called it a "grim" city, [View Full Entry]

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Today was my very last day in Berlin. After returning from trekking in Turkey I stopped by in Berlin again to say a final good-bye to my friends there. We had a fantastic evening, which turned rather sad when it was time to part ways. It was great evening - thanks to all you guys! Next stop: Klaipeda (Lithuania). For more pictures have a look at [View Full Entry]

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